Elon Musk led Twitter plans to let go of 50 employees in the product division soon bringing down the company’s total headcount to below 2,000, according to a new report on Wednesday by Insider citing sources. This development comes about six weeks after Musk told the staff that there would not be any further retrenchment, as per the report.
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Twitter has not commented on the development yet.
New boss Musk took over Twitter in October in a $44 billion deal, and rolled out multiple product and organisational changes including Twitter-verified Blue check-mark as a paid service. Within weeks of joining, he also sacked half of the staff of the 7,500-strong workforce.
In November, Musk said that Twitter was facing "a massive drop in revenue" as advertisers dropped out. The social media platform’s revenue for the fourth quarter fell about 35 percent to $1.025 billion, a top ad executive revealed at a staff meeting, according to the Information.
Also Read: From mass layoffs to resignations: How Elon Musk's Twitter went from 7,500 to 2,900 employees in three weeks
More than 500 of Twitter's advertisers have paused spending on the micro blogging site since Elon Musk's takeover last year, according to its report. The social media company's daily revenue on Jan. 17 was 40 percent lower than the same day a year ago, the report added.
Staff cuts so far, which also included employees working in the content moderation division, have stoked fears of a surge in hate speech on the platform.
After 50 percent jobs were cut at Twitter in the initial few weeks, multiple reports surfaced several times of more layoffs and resignations amid concerns of an "extremely hardcore" work environment involving "long hours at high intensity."
Also Read: From Meta to Amazon to Twitter — A round up of big tech layoffs in 2022
Meanwhile, Twitter said it is now offering an annual plan for its subscription service called Twitter Blue, which includes its sought-after "verified" badge, at a discount to its monthly price.
Users can subscribe to the service for an annual price of $84, instead of a monthly subscription price of $8 on the web and $11 on Apple devices. The discount would be available in countries including the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Japan, New Zealand and Australia, Twitter said.