Twitter plans to lay off 50 more employees

Social media platform Twitter plans to lay off 50 workers in the product division, as per an Insider report. Since Musk took over the reins at Twitter that he bought for $44 billion in October 2022, he laid off almost half of the total 7,500 employees. At the India office, 90% of the staff was asked to leave with just a dozen employees remaining. About 70% of the job cuts in India were in the product and engineering team which also worked on the global mandate. Other departments that faced the brunt included marketing, public policy, and corporate communications.

In November, Musk said that Twitter was facing a drop in revenue due to advertisers dropping out. As per The Information, more than 500 Twitter advertisers paused spending on the platform since Musk’s takeover of the company. In this context, Twitter announced, on January 4, that it will be expanding the permissible political ads on the platform in the coming weeks. The microblogging platform added that its advertising policy will now be aligned with that of television and other media outlets. 

Twitter has not been able to pay its San Francisco office rent. On December 29, the company was sued by the landlord of the building due to failure to pay  $136,260 in rent to Columbia Reit — 650 California LLC, the landlord of the Hartford Building, of which the company occupies the 30th floor. As per the latest reports, hundreds of Twitter office items were sold in a 24-hour online auction organised by Heritage Global Partners. The items under auction included printing equipment, espresso coffee machines, designer sofas, and the blue bird logo. As per a BBC report, the blue bird logo was the most expensive item sold at $100,000.