Twitter: X marks the spot for Elon Musk's growth plans

Image source, AFP

According to a presentation to prospective investors seen by The New York Times, Musk wants to increase revenue fivefold to $26.4 billion.

Last year, the company had revenue of $5 billion.

A new service called X will have an aim of nine million subscribers in the first year and 104 million subscribers by the end of the decade.

The goals are very tentative given the state of global and industry affairs, according to tech industry analyst Kyle Rees.

The New York Times says the revelations are in a pitch deck presented to investors.

It is thought that Mr Musk wants the number of users to double to over 900 million by the year 2028.

The document shows that the number of employees will grow by 3,600. The staff headcount is likely to change in the short term, according to the NYT.

Employees should anticipate work ethic expectations that are extreme, but less than Mr Musk demands.

According to the NYT, advertising generated most of the revenue for the company in 2020.

It is thought that subscription services will pay a key part in growing the revenue of the company.

The document suggests that part of the income will come from a new product called X.

The goal is to increase the number of people who subscribe to the service to 159 million by the end of the century.

In countries where it is available, users can subscribe to the service for $3 a month and get features such as an unhampered tweet button and ad-free articles.

The NYT report was not commented on by the social media company.

Most of these goals seem contingent on the growth of platform users and subscribers, according to Mr Rees from the company.

He said that an entrepreneur with a proven track record of entering industries that favour incumbents and successfully disrupting the status quo was the one he was referring to.

Whether this is payments, satellites, spaceships, automotive, and now social media, Mr Musk has a knack for pushing entire categories of products and services forward, and I suspect that that is part of what we are going to see here.

It is all very exciting. He said that they would have to see if this translated to success.