Elon Musk tells court will find new leader for Twitter; gives staff deadline to resign

Elon Musk told a court on Wednesday he intended to finish an organisational restructuring of Twitter this week and expected reducing his time at there while eventually finding a new leader to oversee the social media firm.

He also gave Twitter employees until 5 pmEastern time on Thursday to decide if they wanted to work for him, and he invited those who did not share his vision to leave.

While testifying in a Delaware court, Musk refuted allegations that his $56 billion compensation package at Tesla Inc., was determined by a compliant board of directors, based on performance goals that were simple to meet.

Investors at Tesla have grown more worried about the amount of time Musk is devoting to turning around Twitter.

At noon, Tesla stock dropped 3 per cent.

"There's an initial burst of activity needed post-acquisition to reorganise the company," Musk said in his testimony. "But then I expect to reduce my time at Twitter."

Musk also acknowledged that some Tesla engineers had been helping to assess Twitter's engineering teams, but he insisted that this had been done on a"voluntary basis" and "after hours."

The first two weeks of the billionaire's ownership of Twitter have been characterised by quick change and mayhem. The previous CEO of Twitter and other senior executives were swiftly dismissed, and earlier this month, he laid off half of Twitter's workers.

(with inputs from agencies)