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Judge: Negotiations for Musk’s trial on Twitter will begin in October / Photo: © AFP
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The start of negotiations in the trial against high-tech billionaire Elon Musk for the failed acquisition of the short-messaging service Twitter is scheduled for October. In a first hearing on Tuesday, the judge in charge of the US state of Delaware accepted Twitter’s request for an early start to negotiations. The company wants to take legal action to force Musk to complete the contractually agreed purchase.
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The founder of the electric car company Tesla and the richest person in the world had blown up the planned acquisition of Twitter for a price of 44 billion dollars due to alleged “false and misleading” information from the short message service. In particular, it accuses Twitter of having too little spam or fake accounts on the platform.
Twitter described this justification as “hypocrisy”. The problem was “fictitious to complicate matters and cause delays,” Twitter attorney William Savitt said. In the acquisition deal between Twitter and Musk, the topic of spam and fake accounts “isn’t even mentioned.” He demanded that negotiations begin in September and referred to the risk of harm to the company if the process drags on.
Musk’s lawyers, on the other hand, said “mountains of data” should first be analyzed to show that the number of spam and fake accounts is actually well above the five percent figure specified by the company. Negotiations are therefore not expected to start before February. With the hearing starting in October, the judge is now much closer to Twitter’s claim.
Observers consider a judicial defeat of Musk and therefore a forced fulfillment of the acquisition agreement quite conceivable. It would also be possible, among other things, for the multi-billionaire Twitter to pay a contractual penalty of up to one billion dollars, as per their agreement.
F. Schulze – BTZ
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