'The Washington Post': Elon Musk plans to lay off 75% of Twitter's workforce

Elon Musk is formalizing the purchase of Twitter and could lay off 75% of its workers. After the recent comings and goings of this acquisition since the tycoon announced it in April, it seems that the purchase is about to close and with it comes the first changes for the social network. The most important: letting go of some 5,000 workers, a figure that would be equivalent to 75% of the workforce.

The decision, which The Washington Post announced exclusively after obtaining several interviews and documents, would mean that only 2,000 workers would remain with the company. A harsh measure that the owner of Tesla and Space X communicated, according to the newspaper, to investors of the well-known social network.

Twitter's management has already announced major reductions that would affect its staff. For example, lowering the company's payroll by approximately $800 million. This in itself would mean that the company would lose almost a quarter of its workforce. Not only would workers be affected, but infrastructure would also be minimized, specifically the data centers that enable the proper functioning of the popular social network.

If all goes according to plan, the acquisition will be settled on Friday, October 28 for $44 billion.

Twitter denies layoffs

Twitter workers are already worried. Edwin Chen, one of the data technicians who deals with spam metrics, says the measures will soon affect users. He tells The Washington Post that he is aware that Twitter has a lot of staff that could be spared but that Elon Musk's proposed solution is "unimaginable" and would mean that its users would also be at risk.

He refers to the fact that accounts could be hacked more easily and that they would also be more exposed to encountering offensive material such as child pornography. "It would be a cascading effect, where you’d have services going down and the people remaining not having the institutional knowledge to get them back up and running, and being completely demoralized and wanting to leave themselves," he said.

The social network, however, assures that the exclusive published by The Washington Post isn't true. Sean Edgett, the company's lawyer, sent an email to workers in which he assured that there will be no major layoffs. The email was seen by Bloomberg which Edgett warns employees of the "tons of public rumors and speculation" that will be published as the closing of the sale nears. However, he also wanted to reassure workers: "We do not have any confirmation of the buyer’s plans following close and recommend not following rumors or leaked documents but rather wait for facts from us and the buyer directly," he explained in the e-mail in which he assured that "since the merger agreement has been in place, there have been no plans for any companywide layoffs."