Musk testifies he will ‘reduce’ time at Twitter and eventually hand over reins

Elon Musk told a court on Wednesday that he expects to reduce his time at Twitter and eventually find someone else to run the social media company.

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

Musk made the remarks while testifying in a Delaware court to defend a $56bn pay package Tesla awarded him in 2018 that helped make him the world's richest man.

Tesla shareholder and heavy metal drummer Richard Tornetta has sued Musk and the board claiming Musk used his dominance over Tesla's board to dictate terms of the package, which did not require him to work at Tesla full-time and came as he was running several other companies.

Musk said the electric car maker was in "crisis" in 2017 and he gave it his full attention. "I was entirely focused on the execution of the company," Musk said.

Musk's testimony before chancellor Kathaleen McCormick comes as he is struggling to oversee a chaotic overhaul of Twitter, the social media platform he was forced to buy for $44bn in a separate legal battle before the same judge after trying to back out of that deal.

Earlier this month Musk announced he was cutting half of Twitter's staff after a "massive" drop in revenue. He told the remaining staff they have until Thursday to decide whether they will leave or confirm they will work "long hours at high intensity" as part of "the new Twitter".