Twitter Inc. chief executive officer Jack Dorsey may be replaced by an activist investor, Elliott Management, founded by billionaire Paul Singer. The firm is pushing for a change stating that the Co-founder attention is divided.
The New York-based activist investor has taken a significant stake in Twitter in an effort to replace the company’s co-founder Jack Dorsey as CEO and has secretly nominated four individuals to stand for election to Twitter’s board of directors.
Jack Dorsey's attention is said to be divided between running Twitter and his financial transactions startup Square, Elliott Management also noted that Dorsey intends to live part of each year in Africa. Although, despite his plans to spend part of the year living in Africa, Dorsey said he won't be hampered by his travel.
"We do need to figure out how to build a company that is distributed, that is not burdened by time zones but advantaged by them," he said.
According to several sources, the hedge fund has taken issue with the CEO divided priorities as Twitter chief executive while also holding the same title at Square, the payments company he co-founded.
Elliott is concerned about the direction of the company as it enters a pivotal year which includes such large-scale news events as the 2020 US presidential election, the Tokyo Olympics and now the coronavirus outbreak.
The San Francisco-based social media group had been a takeover target in 2016, announced early this month that it has added millions of new users and boosted ad revenue in the fourth quarter, sparking optimism over its growth prospects.
