“Twitter is ready and willing to complete the merger with Mr. Musk’s subsidiaries immediately and, in any event, no later than September 15, 2022, the second business day after all previous conditions have been met, which is the timeline required by the merger agreement.”
In the letter, Musk’s lawyers claimed that the amount – which was said to have been paid to Zatko and his lawyer on June 28 as part of the severance agreement – violated one of the terms of the takeover contract. Twitter agreed not to make any severance payments to employees in amounts outside the “normal course of business consistent with past practices,” according to the contract.
Musk first sent a letter to close the deal in July, alleging that Twitter violated the agreement by misrepresenting the number of spam and fake accounts on its platform. Twitter sued Musk to complete the acquisition, accusing the billionaire of using botnets as an excuse to exit a deal that he developed buyer’s remorse for after the market plummeted.
The case between Musk and Twitter is scheduled to go to trial on October 17.
CNN Business’s Claire Duffy contributed to this report
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