Elon Musk Plans to Lay Off Nearly 75% of Twitter Employees, or 5,500 Staffers (Report)

https://variety.com/2022/digital/news/elon-musk-twitter-layoffs-75-perce...

Elon Musk could be set to slash Twitter’s headcount drastically once his $44 billion deal for the social network goes through.

The mega-billionaire has told potential investors in the Twitter deal that he plans to lay off almost 75% the company’s staff, or about 5,500 employees, to reduce the size of its workforce from 7,500 to just over 2,000, the Washington Post reported, citing anonymous sources and documents.

Reps for Twitter and Musk did not respond to requests for comment.

On Tesla’s third-quarter 2022 earnings call Wednesday, Musk said he was paying too much for Twitter. Earlier this month he agreed to go forward with his original $54.20/share offer for Twitter, after spending three months attempting to back out of the deal. “Although, obviously, myself and the other investors are obviously overpaying for Twitter right now, the long-term potential for Twitter in my view is an order of magnitude greater than its current value,” Musk said.

Per the Post story, Twitter management had planned to cut its payroll by $800 million by the end of 2023, representing a 25% reduction in headcount. As such, Musk’s $44 billion acquisition is a “golden ticket for the struggling company,” according to the Post article, “potentially helping its leadership avoid painful announcements that would have demoralized the staff and possibly crippled the service’s ability to combat misinformation, hate speech and spam.”

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