From Frying Pan to Fire: Elon Musk to Address Twitter Employees at Thursday Meeting

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is set to address Twitter employees at an all-hands meeting on Thursday. Musk’s contentious potential buyout of the social media platform has caused plunging employee morale, with one survey finding 78 percent of employees do not believe he has the company and its shareholders’ best interests at heart.

The Verge reports Tesla CEO Elon Musk will be present at a virtual all-hands meeting with Twitter employees on Thursday where he will answer questions as his attempt to acquire Twitter continues. Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal announced Musk’s attendance in an email on Monday.

Twitter employees will have the chance to submit questions ahead of the meeting, which will be the first time that Musk has addressed company employees since publicly announcing his $44 billion takeover attempt.

It has previously been reported that many Twitter employees are upset with Musk’s attempt to acquire the company, with employees in the company’s internal Slack channels making their disapproval known. Many employees are reportedly worried about the effect of a private-owned Twitter on company culture and monetary compensation as many employees receive a portion of their salary in company stock. One survey of employees found that 78 percent of employees doubt Musk’s intentions in buying the company.

Musk’s open criticism of the company’s past decisions, operations, and employees has led to many worrying about their future at the firm. One employee, Twitter’s top legal executive Vijaya Gadde, reportedly cried during a company meeting in response to Musk’s attempt to purchase the platform.

Twitter has agreed to provide Musk with access to its internal data after the billionaire raised concerns about the number of fake or bot accounts on the platform. Now Musk will reportedly be granted access to Twitter’s “firehose” of internal data.

Musk’s recent SEC filing stated: “Musk believes the company is actively resisting and thwarting his information rights (and the company’s corresponding obligations) under the merger agreement. This is a clear material breach of Twitter’s obligations under the merger agreement, and Mr. Musk reserves all rights resulting therefrom, including his right not to consummate the transaction and his right to terminate the merger agreement.”

Twitter denied the allegations, saying in response to the SEC filing: “Twitter has and will continue to cooperatively share information with Mr. Musk to consummate the transaction in accordance with the terms of the merger agreement. We believe this agreement is in the best interest of all shareholders. We intend to close the transaction and enforce the merger agreement at the agreed price and terms.”

On May 13 Musk stated that his purchase of Twitter was “temporarily on hold” due to the company’s low estimate that five percent of its platform consisted of bots. Musk claimed that the platforms’ user base consists of at least 20 percent bots or spam accounts.

Read more at the Verge here.

Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan or contact via secure email at the address lucasnolan@protonmail.com