Elon Musk, the CEO of Twitter, revealed on Thursday that he will step down in six weeks to make room for an undisclosed female CEO. The billionaire, who still controls the social media network, has stated that he will shift his focus to “overseeing product.”
“Excited to announce that I’ve hired a new CEO for X/Twitter,” Musk wrote in a tweet. “She will begin in six weeks!”
The tycoon went on to say that he will become executive chairman and chief technology officer, with an emphasis on “overseeing product.”
While Musk did not identify the new CEO, the Wall Street Journal later reported that Musk had tapped NBCUniversal advertising boss Linda Yaccarino and is already in talks to hire her, citing persons familiar with the matter. Yaccarino has been with NBCUniversal for over a decade and was instrumental in the introduction of its Peacock streaming service in 2020.
A NBC representative declined to comment on whether Yaccarino had been hired by Twitter, and she has yet to respond to the report.
Musk took over as CEO after acquiring the company for approximately $44 billion last October. In the months afterwards, he has reversed many of the platform’s restrictive speech regulations and revealed troves of data exposing its coordination with the US government and pro-censorship NGOs to crush anti-establishment content under previous administration.
Musk also fired almost three-quarters of Twitter’s workforce and implemented a contentious paid subscription model in an attempt to turn the firm profitable.
Musk’s resignation comes after he polled Twitter users in December about whether he should stand down as CEO. 57% of respondents agreed he should, and Musk indicated he would do it as soon as he found someone “foolish enough to take the job.”
