Are you interested in a coffee maker that was once used by Twitter Inc. employees?
Or a neon sign with its logo on it? In a fire sale that begins on Tuesday, supporters of the social media platform will have the opportunity to purchase them. The 27-hour online auction was held by Heritage Global Partners Inc. and is the most recent indication of a change in the business, which Elon Musk, a billionaire, purchased for US$44 billion last year.
The 631 lots of “surplus corporate office assets” vary from the commonplace – industrial-scale cookware and standard office furniture like whiteboards and workstations – to less common items for office auctions, such as quirky signage and more than 100 boxes of KN95 masks. A variety of designer chairs, coffee makers, iMacs, and stationary bike stations with appliance charging capabilities are all included in the mix.
The majority of the goods, including corporate mementoes like a huge Twitter bird statue and a “@” symbol sculpture planter, had beginning bids of US$25. The neon logo was the item with the highest current bid of the lot with around 20 hours left in the auction after receiving 64 bids valued at US$17,500. While the “@” sculpture received 52 bids for a US$4,100 value, the bird statue received 55 offers, raising the price to US$16,000 on the open market.
The sale, according to the organisers, is not meant to help Twitter’s financial situation. Last month, Fortune magazine was informed by a Heritage Global Partners representative that:
“This auction has nothing to do with their financial position”. The auction house was not immediately able to respond to queries sent outside normal business hours.
