Twitter is bringing in the big guns to try to hold Elon Musk to the $44 billion deal he’s attempting to terminate.
A Bloomberg report indicates that Twitter has hired Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz — big names in business merger law — to attempt to enforce Musk’s original agreement to buy the company for $44 billion.
Musk has hired Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan, LLP, who have represented him before — once in a 2019 defamation case which he won and again in an ongoing case stemming from his attempt to take Tesla private.
Musk informed Twitter via his attorneys that he would not be continuing with the deal, citing the fact that Twitter has refused or been unable to verify the number of bots on their platform, in spite of his repeated asking to do so.
“Mr. Musk and his financial advisors at Morgan Stanley have been requesting critical information from Twitter as far back as May 9, 2022—and repeatedly since then—on the relationship between Twitter’s disclosed mDAU figures and the prevalence of false or spam accounts on the platform,” the letter stated, adding, “Notwithstanding these repeated requests over the past two months, Twitter has still failed to provide much of the data and information responsive to Mr. Musk’s repeated requests.”
The agreement originally had a $1 billion “break-up fee” in case either party attempted to back out of the purchase. However, Twitter is attempting to hold Musk to the full $44 billion.
Bret Taylor, the chair of Twitter’s board, tweeted, “The Twitter Board is committed to closing the transaction on the price and terms agreed upon with Mr. Musk and plans to pursue legal action to enforce the merger agreement. We are confident we will prevail in the Delaware Court of Chancery.”
The Twitter Board is committed to closing the transaction on the price and terms agreed upon with Mr. Musk and plans to pursue legal action to enforce the merger agreement. We are confident we will prevail in the Delaware Court of Chancery.
— Bret Taylor (@btaylor) July 8, 2022
The news prompted former President Trump to comment, calling Musk a “bulls–t artist” and saying that he had predicted the deal would fail.
“Elon is not going to buy Twitter. Where did you hear that before? From me.” Trump said at a rally in Alaska. He had previously predicted that the merger would fall through.
