Elon Musk Officially Acquires Twitter For $44 Billion

Giving rest to all the speculations and anticipations over his bid on the microblogging site Twitter, the world’s richest man, and Tesla CEO Elon Musk has finally closed the deal of Twitter acquisition for $44 billion with a per-share value of $54.20. Musk had firstly announced his interest in buying the microblogging platform on 14 April.

In order to avoid the acquisition, Twitter has employed the ‘Poison Pill Strategy’. However, the Twitter board on Monday reached an agreement with Musk and it confirmed the acquisition of the social media platform by the Tesla boss in a press release.

The company in a statement said that it has reached a ‘definitive agreement’ to be entirely acquired by the Tesla CEO for $54.20 per share in cash and the transaction is valued at $44 billion (approximately). It said, “Upon completion of the transaction, Twitter will become a privately held company.”

Musk posted a press statement from his Twitter handle in which he said, “Free speech is the bedrock of a functioning democracy, and Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated. I also want to make Twitter better than ever by enhancing the product with new features, making the algorithms open source to increase trust, defeating the spam bots, and authenticating all humans. Twitter has tremendous potential – I look forward to working with the company and the community of users to unlock it,” Musk said in a press statement posted to his Twitter account.

Musk seems to be having several aspirations related to Twitter and ‘Free Speech’ is the major one that he continues to blame that the platform lacks the same. In an interview, he stated that “Twitter has become kind of the de-facto town square”. He had earlier offered to launch a new social media platform, however, ended up buying majority shares in the microblogging platform, and continuously he has been advocating for an ‘Edit’ button on Twitter. Musk had also indicated towards killing spambots on the platform and had tweeted, “If our Twitter bid succeeds, we will defeat the spam bots or die trying!”

However, on Monday amidst the speculations of the deal, Musk tweeted, 

I hope that even my worst critics remain on Twitter, because that is what free speech means.

Reacting to the acquisition, Twitter CEO, Parag Agrawal tweeted, “Twitter has a purpose and relevance that impacts the entire world. Deeply proud of our teams and inspired by the work that has never been more important.”

Earlier when he firstly announced his will to acquire the social media platform, Musk posted his filing with the United States (US) Securities and Exchange Commission, giving it the title “I made an offer”. In the filing, he had stated that “I invested in Twitter as I believe in its potential to be the platform for free speech around the globe, and I believe free speech is a societal imperative for a functioning democracy,” adding to this he speculated that the company will “neither thrive nor serve this societal imperative in its current form”.

And also, he said that the platform needs a transformation as a private company and as a result of this, he made the offer of acquisition. He mentioned in the filing, “Twitter has extraordinary potential. I will unlock it.”