Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, has been putting his ideas and financial goals for Twitter to investors in recent days. Musk will never be accused of dreaming too small. He has reinvented at least two industries with Tesla, his electronic car company, and SpaceX, the aerospace company. Now he posted his ambitions on the social media platform Twitter, but what exactly do those ambitions mean?
Revenues will quadruple to $26.4 billion by 2028
The first notable figure comes early in Musk’s presentation. The billionaire says he wants to increase Twitter’s annual revenue to $26.4 billion by 2028. Last year, Twitter had ‘only’ $5 billion in revenue.
Reduce Twitter’s reliance on advertising to less than 50 percent of revenue
Under Elon Musk, advertising would fall to 45 percent of total revenue, from about 90 percent in 2020. By 2028, advertising would generate $12 billion in revenue and subscriptions nearly $10 billion, the document said. Other revenue would come from things like data licenses.
Rewatch: What does Elon Musk see in Twitter? Our technology journalist Kenneth Dée explains
Increase average revenue per user by $5.39
With all of these changes, Musk expects to increase Twitter’s average revenue per user, a key metric for social media companies, from $24.83 last year to $30.22 in 2028.
Reach 931 million users by 2028
Musk expects the total number of Twitter users to grow from 217 million at the end of last year to nearly 600 million by 2025 and 931 million within six years. Most of that growth will come from Twitter Blue, among others, where users pay $3 a month to customize their experience on the app. According to the presentation, Musk expects 69 million Twitter Blue users by 2025 and 159 million by 2028.
He expects to have 104 million subscribers for the mysterious ‘X’ by 2028
Included in Musk’s total user estimates are what appear to be subscribers to a new product called X, which is set to have 104 million users by 2028. The document did not provide any details about what X is. Product X will hit the platform in 2023, with an expected nine million users in its first year.
Hiring 3,600 workers, after hundreds of layoffs
According to the document, Musk expects Twitter to have exactly 11,072 employees by 2025. That would be an increase from the current 7,500. But in the meantime, Musk expects the number to fluctuate, rising to 9,225 employees in 2022, then decreasing to 8,332 in 2023 before rising again. Musk will likely lay off employees as part of his acquisition, in order to recruit new talent in the engineering field afterward.
Increase cash flow to $9.4 billion
Twitter will add about $13 billion in debt as part of the acquisition plan. But he expects to be able to pay off that debt because free cash flow, a measure of how much money a company has to pay off its debt, will grow to $3.2 billion in 2025 and $9.4 billion in 2028. would rise even if operating expenses and costs also rise, Musk said.
Also watch: Elon Musk tells what he plans to do with all his money
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