Elon Musk’s company, X Corp., has filed a lawsuit against law firm Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen, and Katz, alleging that the firm overcharged for its services during Musk’s attempt to take Twitter private last year. The lawsuit claims that Wachtell billed a staggering $90 million as a “last-minute” legal bill.
Wachtell had represented Twitter after Musk backed out of his initial offer to acquire the company for $44 billion. The law firm played a crucial role in finalizing the deal in November 2022 and was paid the $90 million fee for its work, which secured the transaction at a significant premium to Twitter’s market valuation at the time.
X Corp., Twitter’s holding company, is seeking repayment of any excess fee payment and attorneys’ fees related to the litigation costs. Representing Musk’s company is Reid Collins & Tsai, a litigation boutique based in Austin, Texas.
Neither Reid Collins nor Wachtell responded to requests for comment regarding the lawsuit.
This isn’t the first time Musk has been involved in legal disputes over payment issues with Twitter’s vendors. Following Musk’s acquisition of Twitter, the company faced numerous lawsuits (at least 26) for non-payment to vendors, as reported by the online legal records database Plainsite. Twitter also stopped paying rent for its San Francisco headquarters and reportedly refused to pay Google for using its cloud infrastructure.
The lawsuit against Wachtell, a prominent U.S. law firm known for representing various companies and investment vehicles in similar deals, adds another chapter to the ongoing legal saga. Wachtell had pitched its representation to Twitter in June 2022, expressing interest in preparing for the possibility of Musk reneging on the contract. Twitter’s former general counsel and ex-finance chief were among the executives involved in engaging Wachtell.
Musk’s attempt to back out of the Twitter deal was highly unusual and ultimately unsuccessful. He claimed that Twitter had not adequately disclosed the number of spam and fake accounts on the platform. In response, Twitter sued Musk for failing to honor his commitment to the company’s shareholders, leading Musk to ultimately proceed with the agreed-upon acquisition.
The lawsuit between X Corp. and Wachtell is being heard in the California Superior Court (County of San Francisco), under the case number CGC-23-607461.
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