Mumbai, May 26: Elon Musk has been under fire since his Twitter acquisition. Recently, he announced that he is stepping down as CEO of the microblogging platform. Now, he is advising Silicon Valley tech companies to fire employees like he did at Twitter.

In a new interaction with Wall Street Journal, Elon Musk said, "There were a lot of people that didn't seem to have a lot of value. I think that's true at many Silicon Valley companies. I think there is the possibility for significant cuts at other companies without affecting their productivity, in fact, increasing their productivity." Elon Musk Defends Twitter Tech Fiasco During Ron DeSantis US Presidential Bid Announcement, Calls It ‘Top Story on Earth Today’.

The outgoing Twitter CEO slashed over 80 per cent of the Twitter staff since he took over in October 2022 after buying the platform for $44 billion last year. This included then-CEO Parag Agrawal.

Elon Musk justified his decisions by saying, "Twitter was in a situation where you'd have a meeting of ten people and one person with an accelerator and nine with a set of brakes." . Ron DeSantis US Presidential Bid Announcement Live Streaming Disrupted By Technical Glitches On Twitter Spaces.

This statement comes after he announced his plans for rehiring staff. Currently, the company has around 1,500 employees (down from 7,500). The job cuts are said to be part of  Musk's strategy to cut costs.

During his firing sessions last year, Elon Musk sent out a memo that said, "We will need to be extremely hardcore. This will mean working long hours at high intensity. Only exceptional performance will constitute a passing grade." Subsequently, several employees complained about working for over 12 hours without overtime.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on May 26, 2023 11:19 AM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).