Tesla CEO Elon Musk became the sole director of Twitter after he dissolved the board on Monday, the social media platform said in a securities filing on Monday, The Hill reported.
Out of the many changes that Musk made to the social media platform, the dissolution of the board of directors is a major step as Twitter’s board members, which included Bret Taylor, Parag Agrawal, Omid Kordestani, David Rosenblatt, Martha Lane Fox, Patrick Pichette, Egon Durban, Fei-Fei Li, and Mimi Alemayehou will now no longer serve on the board, according to the company’s statement.
Moreover, the top executives whom Musk fired immediately after taking control, including Parag Agrawal and Vijaya Gadde, will be entitled to “golden parachute” payouts worth more than USD 122 million. A golden parachute is essentially a contract which entitles top executives of a company to substantial benefits in case they lose their jobs following a merger, takeover, or acquisition. This measure is also known as a “poison pill’ since it can act as a safeguard against hostile takeovers. The debt-funded deal has become a costly exercise even for Musk, the world’s richest man.
Legal costs in particular are likely to have run into the tens of millions of dollars after Musk tried to terminate the deal with Twitter in July, arguing that the company had misled him over the number of bot accounts on the social network. Agrawal is likely to receive the largest payout, worth USD 57.4 million, while Segal and Gedde are entitled to USD 44.5 million and USD 20 million, respectively, according to company filings.
Regarding the changes in content moderation policies, Musk wrote in a tweet that “Twitter will be forming a content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints. No major content decisions or account reinstatements will happen before that council convenes. “
As per media reports, Elon Musk is also planning to start charging USD 20 per month for users to have a verified account. The Tesla CEO also instilled suspicion amongst social media users when he tweeted on his Twitter “Let the good times roll” shortly after he acquired the social media platform and closed the deal.
Musk arrived at the Twitter headquarters earlier this week carrying a sink and documented the event on Twitter, saying “Entering Twitter HQ-Let that sink in!” and also updating his Twitter description to “Chief Twit.”