Amid a spell of layoffs at Twitter, one of the worst the social network has ever seen in nearly 16 years of its existence, Elon Musk on Saturday justified the restructuring decision as he stressed “unfortunately there is no choice”. Twitter, he added, is losing $ 4 million a day. “Regarding Twitter’s reduction in force, unfortunately there is no choice when the company is losing over $4M/day. Everyone exited was offered 3 months of severance, which is 50% more than legally required (sic),” Musk tweeted amid wide criticism of how layoffs have been carried out within a week of acquisition.
The richest man in the world gave an odd explanation for the company’s “huge decline” in revenue on Friday, blaming “activist groups pressuring advertisers,” despite the fact that content filtering has not changed and we done everything we could to placate the activists. Absolutely botched up! He tweeted, “They’re trying to stifle free speech in America (sic).
In a statement on Saturday morning, Elon Musk reaffirmed Twitter’s “strong commitment to content moderation.” Contrary to what you may read in the press, he continued, “we have actually observed hate speech at times this week decrease *below* our past standards.”
The company appears to be in a state of chaos after cutting over half of its personnel, according to retrenchment plans. There have reportedly been 3,800 employees let go.
Senior executives from India have also lost their jobs.
The social media startup, which employs close to 300 people, has offices in Bangalore, Mumbai, and New Delhi.
Last week, upon Musk’s appointment as CEO, the company’s three senior executives – CEO Parag Agrawal, CFO Ned Segal, and head of legal affairs and policy Vijaya Gadde – were told to resign.
Despite the dispute surrounding these executives’ eligibility for pay of more than $100 million, Musk denied the claims that they were persuaded to quit.
The present concerns for Twitter go beyond cutbacks.
Leading businesses including General Mills Inc. and luxury carmaker Audi of America have stopped using Twitter for advertising.
United Airlines Holdings is the most recent company to be added to the list.
It is also said that Microsoft Corp., Verizon Communications Inc., and Charter Communications are thinking about stopping their advertising.
Last week, Musk finally completed a $44 billion deal to acquire Twitter. deal, however, had been dogged by disputes for months and even gave rise to court disputes.