Twitter reassures its employees as the closing of its deal with Musk approaches What is the story?

With entrepreneur Elon Musk's $44 billion deal to buy Twitter close to closing no later than October 28, the company is trying to reassure employees about their hiring and compensation.

Twitter is trying to allay the fears of its employees after a report about the intention of billionaire Elon Musk, in the event of his purchase of the global platform, to lay off 75% of employees, according to the American newspaper The New York Times .

For months, Musk's $44 billion acquisition of Twitter worried the company's 7,500 employees, as the billionaire made statements about how to change the service and then tried to back out of the deal.

After the global businessman returned to the negotiations to buy the company, which will end next Friday (October 28), concern increased within the company.

Employee concerns were fueled Thursday when The Washington Post reported that Musk planned to cut Twitter's headcount by up to 75% in the coming months, reducing its workforce to just over 2,000.

Musk's statement raised concern among employees about how their wages might change once Musk turns the company from public to private.

Late Thursday, Twitter tried to allay some concerns, in a note to employees after the job cut report, and Twitter's general counsel Sean Edgett said there were no plans to lay off workers.

He explained, "We do not have any confirmation of the buyer's plans after the closure, and we recommend not to follow rumors or leaked documents, but rather wait for the facts from us and the buyer directly.

A fateful weapon for its army Will Musk continue to provide free satellite internet to Ukraine?

The relationship of the American billionaire and owner of the "SpaceX" research company, Elon Musk, with Kyiv continues to be tense. Since he declared in a previous tweet that "the Crimea is historically Russian territory" and that it has been since 1783, and demanded that a referendum be held under the auspices of the United Nations within the territories newly annexed by Russia, through which the fate of those territories would be determined.

This tension increased after a new media appearance for Mask, complaining of what he described as the "losses" incurred by his company as a result of providing free Internet service "Starlink" to Ukraine, threatening to stop it if the Pentagon did not intervene to finance it. This could greatly harm the Ukrainian army, which depends on that service for communication and coordination between its units.

Pay or I'll stop it!

On October 14, the American network "CNN" published the contents of a letter sent by SpaceX to the Pentagon, in which the company says that it is unable to continue to pay for the free Internet service it provides to Ukraine, through its network, "Starlink".

In its letter, the US network added, SpaceX asked the Pentagon "to take over funding for the Ukrainian government and Ukrainian military's use of Starlink, which will cost the company more than $120 million for the rest of the year, and could cost nearly $400 million for the next 12 months."

The disclosure of this document sparked Ukrainian and Western anger against Musk, linking his demands in it to a previous tweet by him saying that "Crimea has been Russian territory since 1783."

In response to the request, media reports said that the Pentagon was discussing funding for the Starlink service. And the website "Politico" quoted two officials in the Ministry of Defense confirming that the ministry decided to pay for the Internet service within the framework of the Defense Assistance Initiative for Ukraine, which was established mainly to provide effective and sustainable support to Kiev in order to resist the Russian invasion of its territory.

In the same context, a report by the "Financial Time" newspaper stated that the European Union is also determined to pay for the continuation of the "Starlink" service to Ukraine, according to what three European officials said to the British newspaper.

With criticism coming to him, as well as news of government agencies' willingness to pay, Elon Musk suddenly announced his withdrawal from the funding request . "SpaceX has withdrawn the funding request I previously sent to the Pentagon," he said in a tweet on October 17.

Why is "Starlink" important to the Ukrainian army?

Launched by Elon Musk's SpaceX in late 2020, Starlink provides fast internet to customers in regions where fixed and mobile terrestrial internet networks are weak, via a constellation of satellites placed in low Earth orbit.

Since the outbreak of the conflict in Ukraine, this network has played a pivotal role with the closure of terrestrial Internet services and mobile phone networks. It is widely used in government communications, as well as in coordinating military action, directing missiles, and collecting information on the ground and transmitting it more quickly.

This is confirmed by Dr. Marina Myron, a researcher in defense studies at King’s College London, saying that the Ukrainian forces use the network “for communication, for example, between headquarters and forces in the field”, due to the fact that “Starlink cannot jam its signals such as those of Regular radio, and instrument setup takes only 15 minutes.

SpaceX has supplied Ukraine with several Starlink receivers since the start of the war, while documents obtained by CNN revealed that the Ukrainian military demanded an additional 8,000 receivers for Musk last July. The Ukrainian Vice President, Mikhailo Fedrov , praised the "vital role" played by "Starlink" in supporting his country's forces.