With Elon Musk taking charge of Twitter, a huge buzz was generated around the layoffs at the social media firm as CEO Parag Agrawal’s name emerged in the much-anticipated exits’ list. Chief Financial Officer Ned Segal and Legal Policy Head Vijaya Gadde were other top executives who were shown the way out. Speculation has also been rife about the huge severance pay of over $100 million the top executives were bound to be paid.
As per research firm Equilar, cited by news agency Reuters, the executives stood to receive separation payouts totaling some $122 million.
On Sunday, Musk responded to reports that he had fired employees to stop a stock grant, which was due by November 1. Stock grant means a firm paying an employee in the form of corporate stock. “This is false,” he responded after a journalist – Eric Umansky – tweeted: “What a guy. @elonmusk is making sure to fire people at Twitter before part of their year-end compensation *kicks in on Tuesday.* (sic)” Umansky had shared a report published by the New York Times.
Last week, Director of research at Equilar Courtney Yu told Reuters that the fired executives “should be getting these (severance) payments unless Elon Musk had cause for termination, with cause in these cases usually being that they broke the law or violated company policy.”
Musk’s first big decision for the firm has generated huge criticism. He has also announced that he would be revamping the verification process.
Further, the world’s richest person is also expected to take measures against the bot accounts on the social network – a flashpoint amid the months long controversy around the $44 billion deal.
(With inputs from Reuters)
