Twitter has come full circle and returned to where it began when, this morning, the 140 character social network company introduced co-founder Jack Dorsey as its permanent CEO. For the last four months, Dorsey was operating with the interim stamp of CEO, until now.
Along with the announcement, there was also an SEC filing and a series of tweets from Dorsey, who is also the CEO of mobile payments startup, Square. Adam Bain was also named chief of revenue and partnerships. Bain was reportedly another CEO candidate. Dick Costolo, the former CEO, stepped don on July 1st. Costolo also left the company’s board of directors.
Along with permanent CEO status, Dorsey is also inherited a company that is struggling to gain momentum and the confidence of investors. Twitter’s stock has been hovering the price of 26 a share for most of the summer. Early trading today, the company’s stock was slightly above the $26 mark. The biggest issue for Wall Street is that the company is having trouble gaining ground with the average user. Currently, there has been a slowing growth in monthly active users. Right now, Twitter has 316 million monthly average users, where as Facebook has 1.5 billion.
Dorsey’s goal for pushing Twitter ahead is by making the service easier to use for users who are new to the social network. One of the efforts is called Project Lightning, which is expected to launch soon. Project Lightening is supposed to give people on Twitter a better curated experience when it comes to live events.
Here’s some of Dorsey’s tweets around the announcement:
⚡️ Hello! We have some news to share!
— Jack (@jack) October 5, 2015
We are naming @adambain COO of Twitter, we’re working to change the composition of our Board, and I will serve as CEO of Twitter and Square! — Jack (@jack) October 5, 2015
I’ve been CEO of both companies for over 3 months now. I have the smartest, strongest, and most determined leaders in the world on my teams.
— Jack (@jack) October 5, 2015
My focus is to build teams that move fast, and learn faster. In the past 3 months we have increased our speed and urgency at both companies. — Jack (@jack) October 5, 2015
A few things about each company, and their impact in the world. What we stand for gives us purpose, and that purpose dictates our job ahead.
— Jack (@jack) October 5, 2015
Square stands for economic empowerment. We stand for financial systems that serve instead of rule. We stand for leveling the playing field. — Jack (@jack) October 5, 2015
Square is the most powerful set of tools to start, run & grow a business. Download Square, start selling. Download Square, get cash to grow.
— Jack (@jack) October 5, 2015
Twitter stands for freedom of expression. We stand for speaking truth to power. And we stand for empowering dialogue. — Jack (@jack) October 5, 2015
Twitter is the most powerful communications tool of our time. It shows everything the world is saying rn…10-15 minutes before anything else.
— Jack (@jack) October 5, 2015
Both companies have strong businesses and are well positioned to grow their impact in the world. I will do whatever it takes to ensure that. — Jack (@jack) October 5, 2015
We’re working hard at Twitter to focus our roadmap on a few things we can make really great. And we’re strengthening our team along the way.
— Jack (@jack) October 5, 2015
Our work forward is to make Twitter easy to understand by anyone in the world, and give more utility to the people who love to use it daily! — Jack (@jack) October 5, 2015