Elon Musk says Twitter has seen a massive drop in revenue as layoffs begin

Mr. Musk’s comments came after several prominent advertisers, including the food company

general mills a company ,

GIS -0.24%

Oreo Maker

Mondelez International a company ,

MDLZ 0.79%

And the

Pfizer a company

PFE 0.58%

and others Pause their ads on Twitter The Wall Street Journal reported that in the wake of Mr. Musk’s acquisition of the company. German auto giant

Volkswagen AG

It said it has recommended to its various brands that they pause advertising on Twitter to assess any reviews the company makes to their brand’s security guidelines.

Mr. Musk’s tweet comes after Twitter, in a message he sent to employees Thursday, Staff said they will be notified by 9am on Friday The newspaper reported that if they lost their positions or were still working.

Twitter early Friday began notifying employees who had been laid off, according to documents seen by the newspaper.

Nearly 50% of Twitter’s workforce has been laid off, according to an email sent overnight to one of those affected in the US and seen by the newspaper. It did not specify which departments the terminated employees worked.

Twitter had more than 7,500 employees at the beginning of this year, according to a regulatory filing.

The staff cuts were intended to “put Twitter on a healthy track,” according to the company’s email Thursday. “We are aware that this will impact a number of individuals who have made valuable contributions to Twitter, but unfortunately this action is necessary to ensure the company’s success going forward,” the company added.

In the layoff emails, Twitter said employees with “non-working” status will continue to receive compensation and benefits until the separation date, which was set for one person in early February and for another in early January. She said she expects to receive one month’s base salary as a bonus approximately 45 days after the date of termination, as well as to provide instructions to return company property such as laptops.

Twitter did not say whether employees should expect to receive year-end bonuses, which have historically been based on the performance of individuals and companies. The company also did not say whether employees would receive equity payments during their non-working period.

Some employees said they lost access to Twitter’s communication tools overnight. An email sent to an employee in Canada and seen by the magazine said that suspended access to the company’s systems does not mean that the person’s employment has been terminated.

layoff cap Troubled time for Twitter employees That began in April, when the company revealed that Mr. Musk had become its largest single shareholder. Mr. Musk then agreed to join Twitter’s board of directors, before deciding not to. He launched an offer for the company that was eventually accepted by Twitter. Weeks later, Mr. Musk raised questions about the deal, then tried to abandon it, before reversing course again last month and Saying he would go ahead with the deal. Along the way, he occasionally criticized the company and its executives.

Thursday’s email stated that Twitter’s offices will be temporarily closed to ensure the safety of employees, company systems and customer data. Employees who were in an office or on their way to one were asked to go home, according to the email.

Twitter employees were preparing to cut jobs. The magazine previously reported that the company He was formulating plans for large-scale layoffswhere one investor said up to 50% of employees could be fired and that employees would be evaluated to determine the scope of the layoffs.

Signs of opposition to Twitter’s actions have emerged in the wake of the apparent firings. In a federal lawsuit dated Thursday, a few Twitter employees accused the company of violating federal and California law in not providing enough warning about mass layoffs.

The lawsuit, brought by five former Twitter employees in California federal court who said they were terminated this week, said the company’s layoffs violated the California Federal Worker Retraining Notification and Amendment Act, which requires 60 days of written notice to be given. Advance regarding the dismissal of a large number of company employees at once. The lawsuit asked the court to issue an order barring Twitter from its alleged violations of the acts. Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

In April, as Mr. Musk was heading to buy Twitter, close ally businessman Jason Calacanis proposed reducing Twitter’s staff to nearly 3,000, according to letters between the two, which were released as part of litigation over the deal.

The 3,000 employees would represent the lowest level since 2013, the year Twitter became public, when the platform had about 2,700 employees and revenue was about 13% of its level last year.

Twitter employee numbers started rising in 2019, having ranged between nearly 3,000 and 4,000 for several years. Twitter said the increase in recent years has been driven by investments in engineering, product, design, and research.

Even before he officially took control of Twitter, Mr. Musk indicated he was concerned about the company’s expenses. Twitter has posted a loss in eight of the past 10 financial years, according to FactSet.

Mr. Musk Moved quickly to make changes to staff At the top of the company. Last week, on the same day he closed the deal, he fired Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal and three other senior executives. The newspaper reported that Mr. Musk has fired executives for some reason and says he is not required to pay millions of dollars in severance payments. Other executives have since left.

Mr. Musk has tapped into other parts of his business empire to try to make his mark on Twitter. bring some

Tesla

Mohandessin To start working on reshaping the social media platformThe magazine reported. Also added to the internal company directory were some people who appeared to work for Boring Co. , a tunneling business company founded by Mr. Musk.

Overall, the social media industry suffers from poor revenue from digital advertisers. This announcement was slowed by several factors, including high inflation, the war in Ukraine, and

apple

Privacy changes that made it difficult to track ad performance. Twitter competitor Snap Inc. This year She said she allowed 20% of the staff to leave.

Facebook

Parent Meta Platforms Inc. also She indicated that she was breaking ranks.

Tech companies outside of social media have also embarked on tightening the belt that leads to job losses and hiring freezes. On Thursday, the passenger carrier

Lift a company

Payments company Stripe Inc announced major layoffs, and

Amazon.com a company

She said she would freeze hiring companies for months.

write to Sarah E. Needleman at [email protected] and Alexa Corse at [email protected]