Billionaire Elon Musk, who became Twitter's top boss, has started mass layoffs in a bid to drive down costs following his $44 billion acquisition. The company sent emails to its staff on Friday informing them whether they have been laid off or not. They also barred entrances from offices and cut off workers' access to internal systems overnight.
As per a report in Yahoo! Finance, Mr Musk didn't sign Twitter's layoff memo to the staff. Instead, it was signed, "Thank you, Twitter."
In an internal email to employees, the company said, "In an effort to place Twitter on a healthy path, we will go through the difficult process of reducing our global workforce on Friday." It said that "everyone will receive an individual email".
"If you are in an office or on your way to an office, please return home," the mail added.
The outlet added that Mr Musk's decision to not sign the memo may not come as a surprise. He has avoided publicly naming himself Chief Executive Officer and instead has referred to himself as "Chief Twit." However, the microblogging site's internal systems identify him as the Chief Executive.
Many internet users have slammed him for his move. Responding to the same, Mr Musk, who also heads Tesla and SpaceX, justified the reason for the job cuts. He said that unfortunately "there is no choice." Sharing a tweet, he said, "Regarding Twitter's reduction in force, unfortunately there is no choice when the company is losing over $4M/day. Everyone exited was offered 3 months of severance, which is 50% more than legally required."
As per Tech Crunch, key Twitter teams including Human Rights, Accessibility, Al Ethics and Curation have been axed so far by the Tesla CEO. In India, layoffs have been across engineering, sales and marketing, and communications teams.
