Texts released ahead of Twitter trial show Elon Musk assembling the deal
https://www.npr.org/2022/09/30/11260...pagetopstories
Elon Musk's takeover of Twitter went down via private text messages between the Tesla CEO and a small circle of Silicon Valley's rich and powerful, plus their underlings, advisers and a handful of reporters, politicians and aspiring dealmakers.
The messages were part of court filings and revealed Thursday as part of the pre-trial discovery process in the court battle over whether Musk has to follow through on the merger agreement he signed to buy Twitter. Twitter and Musk are due in court Oct. 17.
The stream of messages includes Musk's exchanges with Twitter founder Jack Dorsey, current CEO Parag Agrawal, Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, and many more.
The court documents show Musk making overtures to Twitter, discussing the importance of free speech, workshopping ideas on how to improve the platform, assembling the financing for the deal, and then deliberating over how to make the struggling company profitable.
Ann Lipton, a professor of business law at Tulane University, says some corporate cases yield "juicy and embarrassing internal emails." But Twitter's case is extra entertaining because Musk is such a colorful figure and Twitter is a high profile company with outsize influence.
Jack Dorsey, who founded Twitter and stepped down in November 2021, discussed taking Twitter private with Musk in late March.