Radical reduction
In a bid to drive down costs, Elon Musk plans to eliminate 50% of Twitter ( TWTR) workforce today, which would result in nearly 3,700 layoffs, according to Bloomberg. The platform's work-from-anywhere policy would also be rescinded, with most of the remaining employees required to report to the office. In one scenario being considered, laid-off workers will be offered 60 days' worth of severance pay as Musk looks to gut a business for which he says he overpaid (the transaction valued Twitter at $44B).
Snapshot: A series of layoffs started as soon as Musk took over the social media company, including CEO Parag Agrawal, finance chief Ned Segal and senior legal staffers Vijaya Gadde and Sean Edgett. In the days that followed, other departures have included Chief Marketing Officer Leslie Berland, Chief Customer Officer Sarah Personette, and Jean-Philippe Maheu, vice president of global client solutions. After the layoffs were sorted, Twitter Chief Accounting Officer Robert Kaiden reportedly left the company, becoming one of the last pre-Musk C-suite executives to depart.
In recent weeks, Musk has started hinting at his staffing priorities, saying he wants to focus on the core product. "Software engineering, server operations & design will rule the roost,” he tweeted in early October. On the product side, the company will soon start charging $8-a-month for verification, which includes badges, and could go live as early as Monday. Reports suggest that users who already have a blue check will have a multi-month grace period before they will either need to pay for the badge or lose it.
Not alone: In October, Meta Platforms ( META) announced that it was eliminating 15% of its staff, or approximately 12,000 employees at Facebook, to slash its headcount as global headwinds and falling ad spends pose serious problems. In August, Snap ( SNAP), the maker of the ephemeral messaging app Snapchat, laid off 20% of its workforce. ( 26 comments) |
