Twitter Accepts Elon Musk s Offer to Buy Company in $44 Billion Deal – WSJ

The takeover, if it goes through, would mark one of the biggest acquisitions in tech history and will likely have global repercussions for years to come, including possibly reshaping how billions of people use social media. Mr. Musk will bring his commitment to a more hands-off approach on speech to a company that has struggled to reconcile freewheeling conversation with content that appeals to advertisers.

On Monday, a day after The Wall Street Journal first reported that a deal was close, Mr. Musk tweeted to indicate that he wants the platform to be a destination for wide-ranging discourse and disagreement.

I hope that even my worst critics remain on Twitter, because that is what free speech means, he wrote.

Mr. Musk said after the deal was announced that he wants to make Twitter a better user experience, in part by adding new features and fighting spam. The billionaire, who is also chief executive of Tesla Inc. and Space Exploration Technologies Corp., has a record of challenging conventions in disparate industries.

Among the issues Mr. Musk will face is whether to allow Donald Trump back on Twitter, after the former president s personal account was permanently suspended by the company last year in the wake of the Jan. 6 violence at the U.S. Capitol. Mr. Trump told Fox News on Monday that he had no plans to return to Twitter, and would instead use his startup social-media network Truth Social as his means of reaching followers.

At an all-hands employee meeting on Monday afternoon, Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal said there are no layoffs planned and that the company s priorities aren t changing before the deal closes, according to a person who heard the remarks. Mr. Agrawal said once Mr. Musk takes over we don t know what direction the company may go, the person said.

Mr. Agrawal said Mr. Musk agreed to convert employee stockholdings to cash once the deal closes and pay them out on the existing vesting schedule, the person said.

Bret Taylor, Twitter s independent board chairman, said the deal reflects the best outcome for shareholders.

The San Francisco-based social-media company had been expected to rebuff the offer, which Mr. Musk made April 14 without saying how he would pay for it.

Twitter, a day after the unsolicited offer came, adopted a so-called poison pill, designed to make it more difficult for Mr. Musk to reach more than a 15% stake in the company.

Twitter changed its posture after Mr. Musk detailed elements of his financing plan for the takeover. On April 21, he said he had $46.5 billion in funding lined up. Twitter shares rose sharply, and company executives opened the door to ne

via www.wsj.com

I’m pleased, but I don’t see how exactly the deal is going to work, except as a gigantic vanity investment.