The world of social media was shaken up on April 4th with the announcement that Twitter no longer exists as an independent company. The news came after a document was submitted in a California court in a lawsuit filed against the company and its former CEO, Jack Dorsey, last year by conservative activist Laura Loomer. The document revealed that Twitter had been merged with X Corp., a newly formed shell company. The move has driven speculation about what Elon Musk, the billionaire owner of X Corp., intends for the social media platform.
Musk has been vocal about his desire to create an “everything app” similar to China’s WeChat, a super-app owned by Tencent Holdings Ltd. used for everything from payments and booking event tickets to messaging. Musk has also previously suggested that buying Twitter would be an “accelerant” for creating X. In fact, Musk tweeted about the merger on April 5th with the single character “X,” leaving many wondering what the future holds for Twitter.
It’s unclear how Twitter will fit in with Musk’s sprawling business empire, which ranges from the electric car giant Tesla to Space Exploration Technologies Corp. (SpaceX). Musk also owns the domain “X.com” – the name of the online payments company he started and eventually merged with PayPal. Musk first set up a trio of holding companies in Delaware with a variation of the name “X Holdings” in April last year as part of his takeover bid for Twitter. But X Corp. was set up on March 9th in Nevada, according to records filed in the state. Its merger with Twitter was submitted on March 15th. Musk is the president of the firm and its parent, X Holdings Corp., which was also set up last month and has an authorized capital of $2 million, filings show.
Mandeep Singh, an analyst for Bloomberg Intelligence, speculates that Musk may create a parent structure similar to Alphabet, where he has all his companies. However, Singh also points out that Musk may have a hard time layering e-commerce or payments into Twitter when larger peers such as Alphabet and Meta have struggled to become an everything app on the consumer side.
The announcement of the merger has sparked intense speculation on Twitter, with Musk’s tweet attracting more than 13 million views within hours. In Japan, the topic “Twitter Gone” started trending, with users joking that Twitter’s new name will resemble that of a local rock band, X Japan.
Only time will tell what Musk has planned for Twitter and how it will fit into his vision for X Corp. But one thing is for certain – this merger has the potential to change the landscape of social media forever.
