In a fresh report, some thousands of Twitter employees have been ordered to stay home on Friday to await another bracing round of layoffs which could see half of their payrolls axed as the new owner of the social media company, Elon Musk launches his major overhaul of the company.
A company-wide email which had been sighted by Africa Today News, New York had also revealed that some of the Twitter employees will also be receiving word on their futures at the company via emails at the start of business Friday, California time.
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And the mass sack has also been described as part of Musk’s push to find ways to pay for the mammoth $44 billion deal for which he took on some billions of dollars in debt and sold $15.5 billion worth of Tesla shares, his electric car company.
Musk, who is the owner of Tesla and SpaceX, has also been reportedly scrambling to find some new ways for Twitter to make some money after his mammoth buyout which would also include charging users $8 a month for verified accounts.
This would help overcome the potential loss of advertisers, Twitter’s main source of revenue, with many of the world’s top brands putting their ad buys on hold, spooked by Musk’s well-known disdain for content moderation.
To mitigate concerns, Musk has vowed that the site would not become a “free-for-all hellscape” though this was quickly followed by a Musk retweet that relayed a conspiracy theory about the assault on the husband of the US House Speaker.
“In an effort to place Twitter on a healthy path, we will go through the difficult process of reducing our global workforce,” the unsigned email said.
The email did not give a number but the Washington Post and New York Times reported that about half of Twitter’s 7,500 employees — mostly based in San Francisco — will be let go.
The company said that in order to “ensure the safety” of employees and company data, the main offices would remain closed and all badge access suspended.
“Those on the way to the office should turn around and return home,” the email added.
It also said that those still employed at the company would find out on their company email, while those shown the door would get notice on their personal email.