Twitter Inc has fired two of its top managers on Thursday amid Elon Musk’s planned buyout of the company. The two fired employees include Twitter general manager, Kayvon Beykpour and the company’s revenue and product lead Bruce Falck.
Beykpour announced his exit from the company on Twitter itself. He said he is leaving after 7 years. In a series of tweets, Beykpour wrote, “The truth is that this isn’t how and when I imagined leaving Twitter, and this wasn’t my decision. Parag asked me to leave after letting me know that he wants to take the team in a different direction”.
“While I’m disappointed, I take solace in a few things: I am INSANELY proud of what our collective team achieved over the last few years, and my own contribution to this journey,” Beykpour added.
Falck, Twitter’s revenue and product lead, was also fired, according to a tweet that has since been deleted. His Twitter bio now says “unemployed.”
“I dedicate this Tweet to those engineers and thank you ALL for the opportunity to serve alongside you. It’s been awesome. There is a lot more to do so get back to work, I can’t wait to see what you build,” Falck tweeted.
Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal responded saying, “Thanks for everything you have done for Twitter – your impact will be felt for a long time, by many people. On a personal note, it has been so great to see how you have always led with your heart, with relentless focus, and a deep care for our teams”.
Twitter also confirmed that effective this week, it is pausing all hiring except for business-critical roles.
In addition, it said in a statement, “we are pulling back on non-labor costs to ensure we are being responsible and efficient.”
Beykpour was the general manager of consumer Twitter, leading design, research, product, engineering, and customer service and operations teams, according to his Twitter bio. A co-founder of the live-streaming app Periscope, Beykpour joined Twitter when the social media company bought his startup in 2015.
“I hope and expect that Twitter’s best days are still ahead of it. Twitter is one of the most important, unique, and impactful products in the world. With the right nurturing and stewardship, that impact will only grow,” he said on Twitter.
In a memo sent to employees and confirmed by Twitter, Agrawal said Twitter has not hit growth and revenue milestones after the company began to invest “aggressively” to expand its user base and revenue.
Musk’s $44-billion deal to buy Twitter was announced last month but still needs the backing of shareholders and regulators.
The takeover is expected to close later in 2022, with Musk — who runs space exploration endeavor SpaceX and electric automaker Tesla — stepping in as its boss at least for a little while.
