Media giant Walt Disney and Microsoft Corp have joined the list of potential bidders for microblogging site Twitter. According to reports, the company is rumoured to be on sale for sometime now, primarily due to stagnation in growth and turmoil in management.
A Bloomberg report indicates that Disney – which owns channels like ABC and ESPN – has been on the hunt for a new media outlet for entertainment, sports and news. If it were to acquire Twitter, it would provide Disney a platform to communicate directly with customers and use the microblogging site to its advantage. Jack Dorsey, the current chief executive officer of Twitter, is already on the board of Disney since 2013.
Microsoft is also said to have joined this list of potential suitors, but the company has declined to comment, while Facebook is reportedly the least interested. These companies would potentially be involved in a face off against Salesforce, a U-based cloud computing company, and Google owner Alphabet Inc.
Meanwhile, Twitter is believed to have hired Goldman Sachs and Allen & Co to negotiate the deal with potential buyers. Although there is no official figure on the bids the company would receive, a Bloomberg estimate has valued the San Francisco-headquartered company at $16 billion (£12.33 billion).
Talks about Twitter's sale surfaced almost two years back, especially after it went through some management changes, which included the exit and re-entry of Dorsey. The company has also been trying to include new features to enhance user experience like moments, altered time-line that outs priority tweets first and even adjusting word limit of tweets through the exclusion of photos, GIFs, videos and polls from the 140-character limit.
Despite this, the company has not grown as expected and its user-base has remained stagnant in the US for six straight quarters. Analysts have warned that any company that buys Twitter will have to be ready to embrace numerous challenges.
