Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk may be set to include (temporary) Twitter CEO to his list of titles once his deal goes through and he becomes the owner of the social media platform.
According to a report from CNBC, “Elon Musk is expected to serve as a temporary CEO of Twitter for a few months after he completes his $44 billion takeover of the social media company, sources told CNBC’s David Faber.”
“Elon Musk is planning to take over as temporary CEO of Twitter after he finalizes the acquisition. Legend,” @APompliano tweeted.
Radio host Clay Travis added, “Elon Musk will be Twitter’s acting CEO when he takes over in a few months. The stock is up nearly $2 in an awful market today on the news of this and additional funding partners.”
Elon Musk will be Twitter’s acting CEO when he takes over in a few months. The stock is up nearly $2 in an awful market today on the news of this and additional funding partners. https://t.co/QJ9SSHXUnq
— Clay Travis (@ClayTravis) May 5, 2022
Following the news that Musk had secured a deal to purchase Twitter, the future of the platform was called into question by a number of people — including relatively new CEO Parag Agrawal.
According to Reuters, Musk already has a new CEO in mind once the deal is closed.
“Musk has also lined a up a new chief executive for Twitter, one of the sources added, declining to reveal the identity of that person. He told Twitter’s chairman Bret Taylor earlier this month that he does not have confidence in the San Francisco-based company’s management,” Reuters reported in late April. “Parag Agrawal, who was named Twitter’s chief executive in November, is expected to remain in his role until the sale of the company to Musk is completed.”
Also according to CNBC, Musk has secured another $7.14 billion in commitments from a number of hand-picked investors — “Commitments range from $1 billion from Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison to $5 million from Honeycomb Asset Management, which invested in SpaceX” — and Musk is talking to former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey about investing as well.
“Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey may back it, and Musk is talking to him about the possibility of contributing shares immediately or before the closing of the merger,” CNBC reported.
Musk has been very vocal about his plans for Twitter, saying that he wanted the platform to first and foremost be committed to supporting free speech and the most “broadly inclusive” forum possible.
Speaking from the Met Gala red carpet on Monday, Musk also noted his commitment to ridding the site of “bots.”
“I’ve also vowed this publicly that we have to get rid of the bots, trolls, scams, and everything. That’s obviously diminishing the user experience and we don’t want people to get tricked out of their money and that kind of thing,” Musk said. “I’m on the warpath! If somebody is operating a bot and troll army then I’m definitely their enemy!”