Axios has new owners as the company announced Monday that it agreed to sell to its most recent primary investor, Cox Enterprises. Furthermore, the agreement between the two companies is for $525 million. 

The deal is structured to secure investments that will continue to pour into local news after the company began providing coverage in 2020 after initially focusing on politics, tech, and business when it was founded in 2016. 

“A big part of this investment is to expand the number of local markets we serve. Local watchdog journalism is so important to the health of any community, and no one is more focused on building that out nationally than Axios,” Cox chairman and CEO Alex Taylor said.

The new deal will also include an additional investment of $25 million in Axios’ media branch to assist the company in growing across its local, national, and subscription news products.

“This is great for Axios, for our shareholders and American journalism. It allows us to think and operate generationally, with a like-minded partner — and build something great and durable that lives long after we are gone,” Axios CEO Jim VandeHei said.

Billionaire Elon Musk challenged Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal to a public debate on the subject of fake accounts and spam over the weekend.

Musk and Twitter are currently in legal proceedings over a $44 billion takeover offer from the Tesla and SpaceX executive. Musk filed a bid with Securities and Exchange Commission to purchase Twitter in April. After both parties agreed to the deal, Musk made the decision to terminate the deal, accusing Twitter of providing him with incorrect numbers in regards to the amount of daily users that are not spam or bot accounts. In retaliation, Twitter sued Musk to ensure the deal would go through.

A Twitter thread by Andrea Stroppa detailed the allegations made by Musk. Musk replied by saying “Good summary of the problem. If Twitter simply provides their method of sampling 100 accounts and how they’re confirmed to be real, the deal should proceed on original terms. However, if it turns out that their SEC filings are materially false, then it should not.”

Musk later asked followers whether they believed less than 5% of Twitter’s daily users were bots or spam. He later tweeted “I hereby challenge @paraga to a public debate about the Twitter bot percentage. Let him prove to the public that Twitter has <5% fake or spam daily users!”

According to a report from CNBC, a source close to Twitter said a debate “is not going to happen outside of a pending trial”.

Vice News and Vice World News have new leadership; as Variety reports, Beverly Chase has been promoted to vice president of current programming and development. 

Chase was most recently the executive producer of long-form for Vice News. In her new role with the media outlet, she will continue serving as executive producer and showrunner of “Vice” on Showtime.

Furthermore, Chase will manage original programming, specials, and long-form projects while growing her position at “Vice News Tonight.”

“Bev’s superb visual sense and masterful command of story powers so much of our award-winning work at Vice News,” said Subrata De, executive vice president and global head of programming and development for Vice News.

“She pushes the boundaries of storytelling in news, insisting on a cinematic and urgent viewing experience for the audience without compromising the journalistic value of the piece. I’m thrilled to see her role expand across our programming.”

Chase joined Vice News in 2015, working on “Vice” at HBO, “Investigations by Vice” at Hulu, and “Vice” on Showtime during her first years with the company. Furthermore, she worked as a producer at NBC News for 15 years.