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Twitter agrees to Elon Musk's proposal
Twitter's board voted unanimously to accept a $44-billion proposal to be bought by Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla and compulsive tweeter.
SAN FRANCISCO - After weeks of will he or won't he; it now appears that Elon Musk will indeed buy Twitter for $44 billion.
Twitter's board voted unanimously to approve the sale which would take the company from being a publicly-traded company to a privately held platform.
Unsurprisingly the Twitterverse had plenty to say about the deal by Tesla co-founder Elon Musk to purchase Twitter.
Musk himself tweeted he wants to make the platform better than ever by enhancing the product with new features. In previous interviews, Musk talked about the important role he believes Twitter plays.
"Having a public platform that is maximally trusted forwardly inclusive is extremely important for the future of civilization," said Musk.
Twitter released a statement confirming the $44-billion deal, saying that at the completion of the sale Twitter will go from being a publicly-traded company to being a privately held platform.
University of San Francisco School of Management Professor Ludwig Chincarini says that shouldn't have a major impact on Twitter users, but will allow the company to act without short-term investor pressure.
"For example, if they believe free speech is one of their primary motivations and that sometimes that would mean less earnings, and things of that sort, they don't have to be hit at earnings calls and manage to those earnings calls," said Chincarini "They can focus on their long term objectives and run the company that way."
Free speech is one of the hot-button issues currently being debated on Twitter, including who would and would not be allowed on the platform. Musk has tweeted that he hopes his worst critics remain on Twitter because that is what free speech means.
Chincarini says users will likely not notice any major changes on the platform right away, and said just because the company goes private doesn't mean it will stay that way. "Going forward seven 10 years? Who knows how long, five, seven years, maybe Twitter will re-list again at a new valuation and then Elon Musk will sell all his shares for hundreds and hundreds of millions," said Chincarini.
Chincarini tells KTVU that shareholders will have to approve the deal. He says he doesn't anticipate any regulatory hurdles to the deal going forward.