World’s Richest Man Dissolves Twitter’s Board and Makes Himself ‘Sole Director’

Twitter’s new owner, Elon Musk has dissolved Twitter’s board and made himself the “sole director” of the company.

All previous members of the board have been removed from that role, leaving only Mr Musk as a director, according to a new filing.

The action was taken on Thursday as part of Mr Musk’s US$$44 billion (£38bn) purchase of the company, according to that same SEC filing, which was made public on Monday.

The board had previously included its chairman, Bret Taylor, as well as recently ousted chief executive Parag Agrawal; in all, it included nine directors. It is just one of a number of substantial changes that Mr Musk has already made, within days of buying and taking over the company, according to Apple news.

Others include the suggestion that he will set up a council that will review content moderation decisions, that he will be firing significant number of employees, and that he could allow previously banned users back onto the platform.

According to multiple reports in the US, Twitter plans to raise the price of Twitter Blue from US$$5 (£4.30) to $20 a month (£17), with verified users given 90 days to sign up or lose their blue tick.

Twitter has not commented on the plans, but Mr Musk responded to questions from users on the platform about verification by saying that the “whole verification process is being revamped right now”.

The verification system is currently designed to help users identify authentic and influential users on the platform, including government figures, sports stars, entertainment figures, journalists and major brands and organisations.

It requires an account to be complete – meaning they have a name, image and confirmed email address or phone number, must have been active within the last six months, and have a record of adhering to Twitter’s rules.

Twitter Blue is only available in a select few countries around the world – not including the UK – and allows those who subscribe to access additional Twitter functions, including in some areas the ability to edit tweets after sending them.

There had been suggestions Mr. Musk would look to subscription options as a way of growing Twitter’s revenue, which is currently heavily dependent on advertising.

After completing his US$44 billion takeover of the platform last week, Mr Musk’s first few days in charge of the company have been eventful.

Amid growing speculation that he would allow banned accounts back onto the platform, he said on Friday that a content moderation council would be created and no “major” content or reinstatement decisions would be made before it had convened.

But in an exchange with another user, Mr Musk hinted at one approach to content moderation, suggesting users could select a film-style age rating to filter content when using the site.

“Being able to select which version of Twitter you want is probably better, much as it would be for a movie maturity rating,” he said.

There has been a major shake off at Twitter after its takeover of Musk, the world’s richest man. Musk’s acquisition of Twitter followed a month-long legal battle between the social media company and Musk, who attempted backing out of the deal over claims regarding the number of inauthentic accounts on the app.

“The reason I acquired Twitter is because it is important to the future of civilization to have a common digital town square,” Musk wrote in a letter addressed to Twitter advertisers.

With his latest acquisition of the social media company, the tech mogul now must divide his attention between five companies spanning transportation, neuroscience and social media.

He is best known as cofounder and CEO of Telsa, maker of electric vehicles, battery energy storage from home to grid-scale and solar panels, among others which he helped started in 2003. He is also the owner of SpaceX, the aerospace company he founded in 2002.