Elon Musk
Elon MuskReuters

Elon Musk on Thursday fired at least four top executives at Twitter as he closed his $44 billion takeover of the social media company, The New York Times reported.

Two people with knowledge of the situation said that the Twitter executives who were fired include Parag Agrawal, Twitter’s chief executive, Ned Segal, the chief financial officer, Vijaya Gadde, the top legal and policy executive, and Sean Edgett, the general counsel.

At least one of the executives who was fired was escorted out of Twitter’s office, the sources told The New York Times.

Earlier this week, Musk pledged to bankers funding the deal that he would close the acquisition of Twitter by Friday.

On Wednesday, Musk appeared at Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters, posting a video clip of himself walking into the offices carrying a kitchen sink and changing his public profile descriptor to “Chief Twit”.

The New York Times report noted that Agrawal, who was appointed Twitter’s chief executive last year, had clashed with Musk publicly and privately in recent months about the takeover. Musk had also singled out Gadde, criticizing her for her role in content moderation decisions at the company.

Musk’s acquisition of Twitter was not always guaranteed, as he announced in July that he was backing out of the deal to purchase Twitter, agreed upon in April, after alleging the firm failed to provide enough information on fake account numbers.

Twitter fired back at Musk and said his bid to terminate the acquisition of the social media company is “invalid and wrongful.”

A day later, the social media company sued Musk in the Delaware Court of Chancery to force him to go through with the deal.

Earlier this month, Musk reversed course and again proposed to buy Twitter for $54.20 a share.