In Twitter Meeting, Elon Musk Fields Questions From 8,000 Employees

SAN FRANCISCO — For months, Elon Musk has publicly trashed Twitter, even however he is acquiring the business in a $44 billion offer. On Thursday, he last but not least acted like an proprietor.

In an hourlong concern-and-solution session in the early morning with Twitter’s 8,000 or so workers — the to start with time Mr. Musk has spoken with them considering the fact that he agreed to get the social media enterprise in April — the world’s richest gentleman opened up about his designs for the company. In an effusive and at situations rambling deal with, he touched on matters as different as development, prospective layoffs, anonymity, Chinese applications, the existence of alien daily life-kinds and even the cosmic nature of Twitter.

“I want Twitter to contribute to a better, extensive-long lasting civilization where we greater recognize the nature of truth,” Mr. Musk reported in the assembly, which was livestreamed to Twitter personnel and which The New York Instances listened to.

The 50-12 months-aged added that he hoped the company could assistance humankind “better understand the nature of the universe, as significantly as it is doable to fully grasp.”

The assembly, which Mr. Musk participated in from his cellphone in what appeared to be a lodge room, recommended that he was set on closing the blockbuster acquisition. His intentions had been in question in recent weeks when the billionaire, who also runs the electrical carmaker Tesla and the rocket company SpaceX, continuously elevated thoughts about Twitter’s pretend accounts in an obvious pretext for potentially ending or renegotiating the offer.

Due to the fact April, the famously mercurial Mr. Musk has tweeted that the buy was “on hold” and accused Twitter of “actively resisting and thwarting” his legal rights. At a different point, he had criticized some of the company’s executives. He manufactured his inflammatory opinions as worldwide marketplaces tumbled and shares of Tesla, which are his key source of wealth, plummeted.

The antics from Mr. Musk, who is spending $54.20 a share to purchase Twitter, experienced left investors, the company’s workforce and others guessing as to what he may possibly do. Twitter’s inventory is now trading around $37. However the company has insisted that the offer remains on track and that it has been sharing details with Mr. Musk, who is on the hook for a separation cost of $1 billion if he walks absent.

Mr. Musk did not instantly address on Thursday irrespective of whether he would near the deal with Twitter, but he manufactured it very clear to workers that he experienced grand ambitions.

Through the discussion, which was moderated by Twitter’s main internet marketing officer, Leslie Berland, Mr. Musk claimed he hoped to develop the assistance to extra than a person billion end users throughout the world. That would be just about four times the amount of current customers. He additional that he was hands-on at Tesla and envisioned to be so at Twitter.

Even with this kind of a general performance, some cautioned that Mr. Musk could even now improve his thoughts about completing the deal for Twitter.

“I think he’s running on two tracks,” explained Ann Lipton, a professor of company governance at Tulane Law School. “Maybe he wishes to decreased the price or even cancel the offer. If the deal goes by means of, he needs more traders.”

She added: “Publicly talking to Twitter staff, trying to assuage their problems, perhaps provides reassurances to prospective traders. But I’m not apparent irrespective of whether that’s his Approach B or his Strategy A.”

Twitter declined to remark on the conference, and Mr. Musk did not answer to a request for remark.

Mr. Musk experienced been scheduled to discuss to Twitter’s personnel weeks ago, but the session did not choose spot. Then more than the past week, the San Francisco-centered company commenced accumulating thoughts for him from employees on its inside Slack messaging system. The conference, scheduled to commence at 9 a.m. San Francisco time, started a few minutes late, with Parag Agrawal, Twitter’s chief government, thanking Mr. Musk.

Then Mr. Musk started off answering issues, including about distant operate. This thirty day period, he despatched memos to personnel at Tesla and SpaceX indicating he expected them to be in the office environment for 40 several hours a week. Twitter’s staff members have mostly labored remotely in the coronavirus pandemic.

Mr. Musk told Twitter workers that he was open up to their operating remotely, supplied that building program is distinctive from exhibiting up day-to-day to create autos. But he said a wide deficiency of in-place of work participation could lead to a dwindling “esprit de corps” and hoped that people would be eager to go into the business additional in the long term.

Mr. Musk dodged right answering whether there would be layoffs at Twitter, even though his answer was considerably ominous.

“Right now, expenditures exceed profits,” he stated. “That’s not a good condition.”

At a further point, he digressed into a discussion about whether or not extraterrestrial life was probable, nevertheless it was unclear exactly where he netted out. He also brought up the Chinese apps WeChat and TikTok as aspirational, presented that WeChat is so embedded in people’s daily lives in China and TikTok is “not monotonous.”

1 enhancement that Mr. Musk claimed he desired to make was incorporating payments technological know-how to Twitter. Ideally, buyers would be capable to send income again and forth as a result of the company, equivalent to how merchandise like Venmo or Square Income function.

Mr. Musk, a longtime ability person of Twitter with much more than 98 million followers, has prolonged explained he thinks the company’s opportunity is underutilized. He has extra that he hopes to rejuvenate the company exterior the eye of the community markets by taking the firm non-public and producing sizeable changes to how Twitter operates.

Inside Twitter, some employees have had blended emotions about Mr. Musk. Some have said they are concerned by his Twitter habits and murky politics.

On Thursday, workers at SpaceX circulated a memo stating that they have been also concerned about their main executive’s general public habits — especially how he acted on Twitter — and that it reflected badly on employees.

“Elon’s conduct in the community sphere is a regular resource of distraction and embarrassment for us,” study the letter, which was attained by The Periods and noted previously by The Verge. “As our C.E.O. and most notable spokesperson, Elon is noticed as the confront of SpaceX — each individual tweet that Elon sends is a de facto community statement by the organization.”

Others at Twitter have claimed they were being anxious by how Mr. Musk needs to consider a laissez-faire solution to policing the system.

On Thursday, he emphasised that he desired to make Twitter as inclusive a platform as feasible, generally by getting far more users, incorporating that he would not allow for prison functions to be carried out on the community. He claimed that he also did not want to make men and women use their genuine names on Twitter and that there was utility in utilizing pseudonyms to convey political sights on the service.

Some Twitter staff, who have pointed to Mr. Musk’s popularity as an innovator, reported they felt heartened following Thursday’s conference. Mr. Musk was not hostile and seemed to have a eyesight for the products, irrespective of not currently being in a position to enunciate it plainly at periods, they stated. Other folks explained he experienced not dealt with their questions, with a person staff writing in an internal Slack message, which was viewed by The Occasions, that “if you took a drink each time he answered a query, you’d be painfully sober at the finish of this.”

Mr. Musk was noncommittal when asked if he planned to believe the main government role at Twitter when he took around the company. He explained he wasn’t a regular C.E.O. and pointed to his title at Tesla, which is Technoking. But he also famous that he experienced several tips for item updates and how the provider really should evolve, and that he would make these regarded to other individuals within just the business.

“I do hope that they will hear to me in this regard,” Mr. Musk stated.

Ryan Mac and Lauren Hirsch contributed reporting.