Social media giant Twitter announces layoffs amid snags in Elon Musk deal

07/12/2022 / By Ramon Tomey

Big Tech firm Twitter announced that it will let go of several employees as it deals with issues about Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s purchase of the platform.

The San-Francisco based company laid off 30 percent of its recruitment staff on the afternoon of July 7, said a TechCrunch report. A spokesperson confirmed the staff cuts, but declined to provide details regarding the total number of affected employees and the severance packages for them. They added that the remaining recruitment staff will be “reprioritized due to decreased hiring.”

The July 7 layoffs came amid a company-wide hiring pause in May. Twitter froze most recruitment efforts for backfill positions, save for critical roles in the company. The Big Tech company said the layoffs are a way for the company to refocus its business needs during a lean period.

The layoffs were not only limited to rank-and-file employees, as several Twitter executives also departed the company. Also in May, Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal let go of Revenue Product Lead Bruce Falck and Consumer Product General Manager Kayvon Beykpour – with the latter departing while on paternity leave.

Agrawal replaced Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey as the company’s CEO in December 2021. The former chief technology officer for the social media giant also saw two key executives depart shortly after assuming leadership – Chief Design Officer Dantley Davis and Head of Engineering Michael Montano. Two more leaders, Chief Information Security Officer Rinki Sethi and Head of Security Peiter Zatko, left Twitter in January 2022.

According to SFGATE, “social media networks aren’t immune to the [job] market downturn,” citing the more than 30,000 tech workers being laid off in the past two months. It also mentioned that other companies, including Facebook’s parent company Meta, “have also taken precautionary measures to manage their overhead in a time of economic upheaval.”

Late last month, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg revealed that he plans on “turning up the heat” on performance goals with a view to losing employees who cannot reach them. His revelation followed a memo the company issued to employees in May, saying that recruitment would be paused due to “slower revenue growth than anticipated.”

“Realistically, there are probably a bunch of people at the company who shouldn’t be here. Part of my hope by raising expectations and having more aggressive goals, and just kind of turning up the heat a little bit, is that I think some of you might decide that this place isn’t for you – and that self-selection is OK with me,” he told employees during a June 30 Q&A session.

Musk-Twitter deal in a precarious situation due to spam bot data

Twitter’s July 8 staff cuts coincided with Musk’s potential buyout of the company going downhill. The $44 billion takeover plan finalized in May entered a precarious situation after Musk accused the company of falsely indicating the number of bots on Twitter. The company has repeatedly stood by its claims, despite the Tesla CEO’s protestations.

But even though Musk reneges on the deal, he is not off the hook yet, according to analysts. They pointed out that the contract “is still set in stone” and that he will have to shell out a minimum of $1 billion if he backs out. (Related: Could it be that Elon Musk’s “intent” to purchase Twitter was a head fake to expose their fraud to the SEC?)

“Some have been asking why a ‘lame-duck’ CEO would make these changes if we’re getting acquired anyway,” Agarwal tweeted back in May. “While I expect the deal to close, we need to be prepared for all scenarios and always do what’s right for Twitter.” If the deal pushes through, Agarwal would also be forced off as Twitter CEO.

Musk himself remarked during a call with Twitter employees that he is not concerned with what title he would have in the company. Instead, he reiterated that he wants to be heavily involved in product.

Several Twitter employees voiced concerns to Musk about potential layoffs in response to the macroeconomic environment. Musk responded: “Right now, costs exceed revenue. That’s not a great situation.”

BigTech.news has more stories about Twitter and other social media companies.

Watch American Renaissance founder Jared Taylor below saying that Twitter hates the idea of free speech, not Elon Musk.

This video is from the American Renaissance channel on Brighteon.com.