Steph Deschamps / October 21, 2022

Elon Musk plans to lay off nearly 75 percent of Twitter’s 7,500 employees if he succeeds in buying the social network, according to information published Thursday by the Washington Post.

The boss of Tesla and SpaceX has told potential investors that he intends to reduce the company to about 2,000 employees, according to the American daily.

The multi-billionaire is a priori about to buy the social network for $44 billion, after months of economic and legal twists and turns.

But even if Elon Musk fails to acquire Twitter, the platform plans to fire nearly a quarter of the staff by the end of 2023 anyway, according to Washington Post sources. Twitter did not immediately respond to a request from AFP.

The whimsical executive had made an acquisition offer that was accepted by the group’s board of directors at the end of April, stating at the time that his priority was not profitability but the defense of freedom of expression.

He then sought to unilaterally extract himself from the agreement, accusing the company of having lied to him about its fight against automated accounts and spam.

Twitter filed a lawsuit in early July, and Elon Musk finally assured earlier this month that the deal would actually go through. The judge adjourned the trial that should have taken place this week, and gave both parties until October 28 to reach a new agreement.

In mid-June, during a question-and-answer session with employees of the San Francisco-based company, the businessman emphasized his ambition to reach one billion users – instead of the current 230 million – and to diversify revenue sources.