Elon Musk Countersues Twitter Ahead Of October 17 Trial Over $44 Billion Takeover Deal: Report

Elon Musk's lawsuit was filed after Delaware court ordered a five-day trial beginning October 17 to determine if the Tesla CEO can walk away from the $44 billion Twitter deal.

Twitter agreed to an October 17 trial but insisted on a commitment to complete the proceedings over the $44 billion acquisition deal in five days.

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New Delhi: Escalating his legal fight against Twitter, Tesla-SpaceX CEO Elon Musk countersued Twitter Inc's on Friday following the case over his decision to walk away from the $44 billion deal. The lawsuit was filed after Chancellor Kathaleen McCormick of the Delaware Court of Chancery ordered a five-day trial beginning October 17 to determine if Musk can walk away from the deal.

According to a report by Reuters, the lawsuit was filed confidentially. The 164-page document was not publicly available, however, under court rules a redacted version could soon be made public.

Twitter is yet to respond the development.

Previously, Twitter agreed to an October 17 trial but insisted on a commitment to complete the proceedings over the $44 billion acquisition deal in five days. In a court filing on Wednesday, the social media platform said Twitter does not object to a proposal by Elon Musk to start on October 17 a trial but the social media company wants a commitment to complete the trial in five days, as per Reuters.

"Twitter sought that commitment because it believes Musk’s objective remains to delay trial, render impracticable the Court’s expedition order, and thus avoid adjudication of his contractual obligations," said the Twitter filing, as quoted by Reuters.

Twitter claimed that Musk is delaying the process by refusing to answer the company's complaint, which would clarify the issues and any counterclaims he may assert.

Musk had abandoned his Twitter takeover alleging that the microblogging platform breached the agreement by misrepresenting the number of fake accounts on its platform.

Following this, Twitter sued the Tesla CEO calling the fake account claims a distraction and said that Musk was bound by the merger contract to close the deal at $54.20 per share.

Twitter has blamed the court fight for affecting its revenue while causing chaos within the company.

As per Reuters, while the two sides agreed to an October 17 trial, they are at cross-ends over the limits of discovery or access to internal documents and other evidence.

Musk targetted Twitter over its response to his discovery requests. On the other hand, Twitter accused him of seeking huge amounts of data that it deemed irrelevant to the main issue in the case which to ascertain whether Musk had violated the deal contract.

"This order does not resolve any specific discovery disputes, including the propriety of any requests for large data sets," said McCormick, as quoted by Reuters.

On its part, Twitter has termed the allegations of fake accounts a distraction and pushed the trial to ensure that Musk commits to the deal arguing that delay damages its business.