Elon Musk spent four hours with ex-Tesla shareholder and billionaire buddy Larry Ellison at a suave Malibu Asian restaurant as their legal fight with Twitter continued.
Musk, 51, enjoyed the long luxury meal with tech magnate Larry Ellison, 77, at Southern California’s trendiest eatery, Nobu, late into the night Wednesday.
Software entrepreneur Ellison, worth an estimated $106billion, is the world’s sixth richest man, according to Forbes.
Meanwhile, Musk, whose net worth is $266billion, is number one.
World’s richest man Musk (left and right, outside Nobu last night) spent four hours with Ellison
Larry Ellison (center, embracing Musk, right) is pictured at the LA hotspot as a guard watches
The pair of Tesla stockholders and onetime Twitter buyers are part of a lawsuit filed by Twitter
After dinner: Musk drops Ellison, 77, off at his car at the end of the meal late Wednesday night
The pair may have snacked on $58 crab tempura, $70 Maine lobster, or a New York steak with mushrooms, which goes for a less than slender $92.
Nobu’s multi-course tasting menu costs just shy of $200.
It’s likely the well-fed billionaires discussed Musk’s withdrawn bid to buy Twitter, which has turned into a bitter legal feud.
The Silicon Valley firm has taken Musk to court in Delaware in an effort to force him to buy the company for the agreed price after he sensationally pulled out of the deal last month.
Ellison, who gave $1billion toward Elon’s $44billion bid, was subpoenaed by Twitter in the past two weeks.
The veteran tech billionaire has now been dragged into the ongoing court battle set to begin on October 17, Bloomberg reported.
Twitter lawyer Bill Savitt slammed Musk as a ‘liar looking to conjure an exit ramp for a deal that doesn’t have one’.
But Musk claims he shut down the deal because Twitter evaded handing over information about the number of fake and spam accounts operating on the platform.
Twitter’s lawsuit argues: ‘Having mounted a public spectacle to put Twitter in play, and having proposed and then signed a seller-friendly merger agreement, Musk apparently believes that he – unlike every other party subject to Delaware contract law – is free to change his mind, trash the company, disrupt its operations, destroy stockholder value, and walk away.’
Musk is pictured leaving his supercar in a simple black T-shirt as bodyguards took care of him
Asian restaurant Nobu in Malibu is a popular haunt with A-list guests including the Kardashians
Musk was handed $1billion by Ellison as part of his withdrawn $44billion bid to buy Twitter
Delaware courts have in the past forced prospective buyers to follow through on signed merger agreements, though the facts differ in each case.
In 2020, Tiffany & Co sued Louis Vuitton parent company LVHM when the luxury umbrella group attempted to back out of a deal to acquire the jewelry maker.
The litigation was settled out of court when LVHM agreed to complete the takeover of Tiffany at a slightly reduced price.
Twitter’s lawsuit will be heard in Delaware chancery court from mid-October as both Twitter and the company Musk is using to complete the merger are officially incorporated in Delaware.
The lawsuit accuses Musk of ‘a long list’ of violations of the merger agreement that ‘have cast a pall over Twitter and its business.’
Musk walks to the entrance of Nobu alongside a plainclothes security guard
One of LA’s hottest dining spots, Nobu Malibu (left and right) is popular with a host of A-listers including the Kardashians
Ellison (pictured in 2019) gave $1billion toward Elon Musk’s withdrawn bid to purchase Twitter
Legal experts have said that from information that is public, Twitter would appear to have the upper hand because of the way Musk negotiated the deal, declining to do traditional pre-merger diligence.
Musk has launched many of his attacks in the merger saga from Twitter itself, most recently tweeting a series of memes mocking the company for attempting to enforce the agreement.
Twitter has retained heavy-hitting law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen and Katz to pursue its lawsuit against Musk.
The hiring of Wachtell gives the company access to lawyers Leo Strine and Bill Savitt, who previously served as Chancellors of the Delaware Chancery Court.
Delaware’s chancery courts deal with non-jury proceedings overseen by judges known as chancellors.
They often tackle business wrangles, with many top US firms – including Twitter – basing their corporate headquarters there, even when their main offices lie elsewhere.
Chancery courts cannot order punitive damages to be paid, and generally hear cases more quickly than criminal trials, with the Twitter case likely to be wrapped up within a few months.
Musk hired Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP., the firm that defended him in a 2019 defamation case, and is currently representing him in a lawsuit related to Tesla.
Musk’s withdrawal, filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, alleged Twitter failed to respond to repeated requests for information over the past three months, or obtain his consent before taking actions that would impact its business – such as firing two key executives.
Experts speculated the move may have been a bid to drive the price down. Musk initially offered $54.20 per share in April, but the market price of the shares was down to $36.81 in the wake of the deal’s collapse.
Bret Taylor, Twitter’s chairman, tweeted in the aftermath that the board was ‘committed to closing the transaction’ under the current terms of the deal and they were ‘confident’ they would win.