First, we learned that Elon Musk had purchased enough shares of Twitter to become its largest individual shareholder. The company announced Musk would take a seat on its board of directors, but within the space of a week, that plan unraveled, and Musk informed the board he would not accept the position.
Elon’s next move came in the form of an unsolicited offer to buy 100 percent of Twitter’s shares for $54.20 each, or about $44 billion. Twitter accepted Elon Musk’s offer to purchase the company for $44 billion. Elon Musk was acquiring Twitter!
Of course, things couldn’t be that simple.
On July 8th, after prolonged posturing and many, many tweets, Musk sent a letter to Twitter saying he plans on terminating their merger agreement, claiming the company is in material breach of the deal and accusing Twitter of “false and misleading representations upon which Mr. Musk relied when entering into the Merger Agreement.” His claim that Twitter breached the deal relies on an argument that has not accurately represented the amount of spam and bot activity on the platform and has failed to satisfy his requests for evidence proving otherwise.
Twitter then sued Musk in an effort to force him to finish the deal, and the fight is now headed to trial in Delaware’s Chancery Court in October. That is, of course, unless the two sides settle. With Elon Musk, you never know.
Musk, who already leads Tesla, SpaceX, The Boring Company, and Neuralink, is one of Twitter’s most visible users, with a large audience of devoted followers. The billionaire exec spontaneously shares earthshaking company plans, uncredited memes, and bizarre accusations. That’s in addition to responses that serve as a global tech support line for people who want everything from help with their electric car to politicians seeking satellite internet so they can keep citizens connected during a war.
If he does end up Twitter’s new owner, he has said he plans to turn the platform into something more like WeChat and TikTok, would bring Donald Trump back to the platform, and thinks Twitter could have a billion users in just a few years. No matter who ends up owning the company, though, it seems Twitter may never be the same.
