Elon Musk will directly answer questions from Twitter employees during all-hands meeting this week

By Jacky On Jun 14, 2022

Elon Musk will speak to Twitter employees this week for the first time since he made his $44 billion bid for the company in April, Twitter chief executive Parag Agrawal told staff on Monday.

The company’s virtual all-hands meeting is scheduled for Thursday, and Musk will answer questions directly from Twitter employees, Insider reported.

It comes after Twitter said last week it expected shareholders to vote on the sale in early August.

Twitter confirmed that Musk would attend the all-company hands-on meeting this week. Twitter’s chief marketing officer and chief of people Leslie Berland will moderate the conversation.

Earlier this month, Musk warned Twitter that he could walk away from his deal to take over Twitter if it doesn’t provide details of the spam and fake accounts he’s been looking for.

In April, at an all-employee meeting with employees, Agrawal was seen quelling employee anger after employees demanded answers about how executives planned to deal with an expected mass exodus triggered by Musk.

Elon Musk (left) will speak to Twitter staff this week for the first time since he made his $44 billion bid in April, Twitter chief executive Parag Agrawal (right) told staff

Twitter’s chief marketing officer and head of people Leslie Berland will moderate the call

Last week, Twitter expected to hold a shareholder vote on the sale of $44 billion to Musk in early August, top executives told employees.

Musk’s lawyers warned Twitter that he could walk away from the acquisition if the company doesn’t provide the data it seeks about spam and fake accounts.

But the social media company appears to be intent on making the sale — even promising to give Musk direct access to its “fire hose” of real-time data to self-determine the number of “bots” on the platform.

A Twitter spokesperson referred to DailyMail.com as an earlier company statement that said the company plans to fully enforce the terms of the April 25 contract that Musk signed to buy the company for $54.20 a share.

“We believe that this agreement is in the best interest of all shareholders. We intend to complete the transaction and enforce the merger agreement at the agreed price and terms,” the statement said.

Last week, Twitter expected to hold a shareholder vote on its $44 billion sale to Musk in early August, executives told employees

GlobalData’s analysis was based on a statistical model that took into account a number of variables (above) to determine the proportion of spam accounts on Twitter

Despite Musk’s threats to walk away, Twitter has the option of taking him to court if he refuses to honor his agreement to buy the company.

The outcome of such a move is unclear, as Musk could make several arguments as to why he is not obligated to implement the agreement.

“Twitter has and will continue to cooperate in sharing information with Mr. Musk to complete the transaction in accordance with the terms of the merger agreement,” the company said.

Part of that data is the so-called ‘firehose’, a dataset consisting of all tweets on the platform analyzed by various parameters, such as users’ devices or profiles of accounts that publish tweets, according to acquaintances.

Twitter is selling this data to companies that monitor social media as part of its licensing activities, but plans to provide this data to Musk for free as part of its information sharing, the sources said.

The fire hose does not contain any confidential information, such as personal details of Twitter users that are not public or how often they verify their accounts, the sources said.

The fire hose, which is currently available to a handful of companies for an undisclosed subscription fee, could be released this week to Musk, the Washington Post reported.

Meanwhile, a new study suggests that about 10 percent of active Twitter accounts post “spam content.”

London-based data analytics firm GlobalData said in a report Wednesday that its mathematical model showed that spam accounts are about double the 5 percent share that Twitter claims.

Musk has threatened to relinquish his agreement to buy the company unless Twitter supports its estimate that fake or spam accounts make up less than 5 percent of its user base.

“The exact proportion of spam accounts is difficult to calculate because it is nearly impossible to confirm the identity of the entity behind a tweet,” said GlobalData senior data scientist Sidharth Kumar.

TIMELINE OF ELON MUSK’S BID TO CHECK TWITTER

January 31st† Musk begins buying shares of Twitter in near-daily installments, acquiring a 5% stake in the company in mid-March.

March 26: Musk, who has 80 million Twitter followers and is active on the site, said he is “thinking seriously” about building an alternative to Twitter, questioning freedom of speech on the platform and whether Twitter supports democracy. undermines. He also privately contacts Twitter board members, including his friend and Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey.

27 March: After privately informing them of his growing stake in the company, Musk begins talks with Twitter’s CEO and board members about possible board membership. Musk also mentions taking Twitter private or starting a competitor, according to subsequent registration requests.

April 4: A filing filing reveals that Musk quickly became Twitter’s largest shareholder after acquiring a 9% stake, or 73.5 million shares, worth about $3 billion.

April 5th: Musk will be offered a seat on Twitter’s board on the condition that he acquire no more than 14.9% of the company’s shares. CEO Parag Agrawal said in a tweet that ‘it became clear to us that he would be of great value to our Board’.

11 April: Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal announces that Musk will not join the board after all.

Apr 14: Twitter reveals in a securities filing that Musk has offered to buy the company for about $44 billion.

15 of April: Twitter’s board unanimously approves a “poison pill” defense in response to Musk’s proposed bid, in an effort to thwart a hostile takeover.

April 21: Musk arranges $46.5 billion in funding to buy Twitter. The Twitter board is under pressure to negotiate.

April 25: Musk strikes a deal to buy Twitter for $44 billion and sell the company. The outspoken billionaire has said he wanted to own and privatize Twitter because he doesn’t think it lives up to its potential as a platform for free speech.

April 29: Musk is selling about $8.5 billion worth of shares in Tesla to fund Twitter’s purchase, according to regulations.

5th of May: Musk is bolstering its offer to buy Twitter with pledges of more than $7 billion from a diverse group of investors, including Silicon Valley heavy hitters such as Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison.

May 10th: Hinting at how he might change Twitter, Musk says he would roll back the Twitter ban on former President Donald Trump after the January 6, 2021 U.S. Capitol uprising, calling the ban a “morally bad decision” and ” foolish in the extreme.’

13 May: Musk said his plan to buy Twitter is “temporarily on hold.” Musk said he needs to locate the number of spam and fake accounts on the social media platform. Twitter shares tumble, while Tesla shares bounce back sharply.

June the 6th: Musk threatens to end his $44 billion deal to buy Twitter, accusing the company of refusing to give him information about his spam bot accounts.

June 16: Elon Musk will speak with Twitter employees for the first time since the launch of his $44 billion bid this week.