One on One with WeWork
It is with great pleasure that the Baker Program in Real Estate and the Cornell Real Estate Council will host WeWork Vice Chairman, Michael Gross (SHA ’97) as the Morning Keynote Speaker at the 34th Annual Cornell Real Estate Conference. To learn more about WeWork and the real estate industry, please join us at the conference this Friday.
A growing audience
WeWork isn’t the first company in the co-working space, but since its founding in 2010, it has quickly become one of the most recognizable startups in the world. WeWork has over 10 million square feet of office space located in 19 countries and a current valuation of more than $20 billion. The odds are good you’ve probably heard of them and may even have used their offices, but did you know that WeWork’s tenant base isn’t just “gig economy” freelancers, early stage entrepreneurs and disruptive tech companies looking to get off the ground? For Example, PepsiCo recently placed employees in the SoHo WeWork location specifically to engage with a community of innovation and to stay competitive by paying attention to possible disruptors. A larger movement that could prove to be a large tailwind for WeWork is the trend of large well-known companies actively investing in the very technologies that are trying to disrupt them. For example, JP Morgan has started to think like the fin-tech startups that are trying to disrupt it’s banking transaction center, and has created its own internal divisions within the company that are working to implement new technology innovations before someone else takes market share. It’s possible for WeWork to see continued growth in large well-established tenants looking to stay competitive. Providing flexible work space to companies both large and small has become big business and WeWork’s brand consistency and reputation for high quality properties is leading the industry forward.
Startup DNA
Many might find it difficult to refer to a multibillion-dollar company as a startup but it’s evident that the company continues to operate like one. It was announced earlier this week that AirBNB and WeWork formed a partnership to complement each other’s services, offering AirBNB business travelers a place to do business at suggested WeWork locations. Aggressive growth though these types of partnerships isn’t uncommon but the disruptive nature built into the DNA of these two specific companies is unique and worth watching if the current trends in disruptive technology continues. As WeWork’s tenant base has expanded and matured over recent years, the company has maintained its roots surrounding a holistic work experience and fostering collaborative creativity. They recently launched the WeWork Services Store which essentially provides discounts on powerful services and applications for entrepreneurs to run their businesses. In conjunction with weekly social events at WeWork locations, WeWork has a product and a philosophy that has proven to be more compelling to a large demographic than the comparable short-term leases of the past.
