No fewer than 1,200 Twitter staff resigned on Thursday, ahead of new CEO Elon Musk’s ultimatum as he continues sweeping changes since his takeover of the popular microblogging platform.

The new resignations come after Mr Musk on Wednesday gave his staff until Thursday to decide whether they wanted to work for him or leave their roles, per a New York Times article.

In an email titled ‘A Fork in the Road’ Wednesday morning, Mr Musk gave Twitter staff the option to either up their efforts or leave.

The 51-year-old emphasised in the mail that Twitter faced a challenging road ahead and provided employees with three months of severance pay if they chose not to stay on to “create a breakthrough Twitter 2.0.”

After a wave of layoffs this month, Twitter’s full-time employees which stood at 7,500 at the end of October have been reduced to about 3,700.

The massive resignation could compound operations challenges for the company which is already feeling the hit for the layoff of over half of its staff strength by Mr Musk in October.

Mr Musk however launched a barrage of emails to Twitter staff on Friday morning, pleading for help from the remaining Twitter staff.

“Anyone who actually writes software, please report to the 10th floor at 2 p.m. today,” he wrote.

Following Mr. Musk’s $44 billion purchase of Twitter last month, the company is on the verge of collapse. The billionaire has worked tirelessly to impose his vision on the social networking platform, laying off 50 per cent of its staff, sacking critics, exploring new subscription services, and sending a stern warning that the business must change or risk bankruptcy.