Elon Musk visited Twitter headquarters ahead of the weekend deadline to complete his deal to buy the company, posting a video of himself in the company’s lobby in San Francisco wearing a sink .
“Enter the Twitter headquarters – let him in!” he tweeted on Wednesday.
Musk also changed his Twitter profile to refer to himself as “Chief Twit” and his location as Twitter headquarters.
Entering Twitter’s headquarters – let him in! pic.twitter.com/D68z4K2wq7
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 26, 2022
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A court has given Musk until Friday to strike a deal to acquire the company, which would end months of turmoil after the billionaire agreed to buy the social network and then tried to back out .
Despite Musk’s thunderous entry into HQ, it was still unclear if his purchase of Twitter had been finalized. Twitter confirmed to The Associated Press that Musk’s video tweet was real but would not comment further.
Reuters reported this week that Musk had informed investors involved in the deal that he expected to complete the takeover by Friday’s deadline.
One of Musk’s biggest hurdles to closing the deal was keeping in place the funding promised about six months ago. A group of banks, including Morgan Stanley and Bank of America, signed on earlier this year to lend $12.5 billion of the money Musk needed to buy Twitter and take it private.
Strong contracts with Musk have tied banks to funding, although changes in the economy and debt markets since April have likely made terms less attractive. Musk even said his investment group would buy Twitter for more than it’s worth.
Musk’s flirtation with buying Twitter appears to have begun in late March. That’s when Twitter said it contacted its board members, including co-founder Jack Dorsey, and told them he was buying stock and wanted to join the board, privatize Twitter or launch a competitor.
Then, on April 4, he disclosed in a regulatory filing that he had become the company’s largest shareholder after acquiring a 9% stake worth around $3 billion.
At first, Twitter offered Musk a seat on its board. But six days later, CEO Parag Agrawal tweeted that Musk would ultimately not join the board. His offer to buy the company soon followed.
When Musk agreed to buy Twitter, he inserted a “420” marijuana reference into its price of $54.20 per share. He sold about $15 billion worth of Tesla stock to help fund the purchase, then gathered pledges for billions more from a diverse group of investors, including heavyweights in Silicon Valley as Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison.
Inside Twitter, Musk’s offer was met with confusion and low morale, especially after Musk publicly criticized one of Twitter’s top lawyers involved in content moderation decisions.
In July, Musk abruptly reversed course, announcing he was dropping his bid, saying the company hadn’t been upfront about its problem with fake accounts he dubbed “spam bots.” Twitter sued Musk in Delaware Chancery court to force the deal, accusing him of making up an excuse to cover up buyer’s remorse.
Two weeks before the scheduled start of a five-day trial, Musk changed his mind again, saying he finally wanted to close the deal.
Meanwhile, corporate morale appears to be plummeting amid news that Musk plans to cut 75% of Twitter staff if he takes over. In a report compiled by Greg Larkin and Elizabeth Gafford by the invitation-only professional membership network Punks and Pinstripes, around 530 employees have left the company in the last three months. The figures reflect a 60% increase in the number of workers who left the company in the last quarter.
Nearly 30% of them went to work for Google or Meta, reports Business Insider. Others went on to work at other companies such as Pinterest, LinkedIn and TikTok.
“The bottom line here is that the uncertainty generated by the fight between Elon Musk and Twitter is driving a lot of their top talent to other social media platforms…These people have options as to where they can go. and they go,” Larkin told Business Insider.
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