The We Company

The global coworking giant is betting that you’re willing to blur the lines between work and life even more.

Scarcely anything is more emblematic of the new world of work than coworking. The one company that has almost outright owned the transformation is WeWork, with 400,000 global members across 550-plus locations and growing. (For perspective, that’s more than 100,000 people more than Starbucks employs.) The company is now the largest tenant in New York and one of the most significant in London – and adds about 500,000 to 1 million square feet of space around the world per month.

Now, newly re-hatched as The We Company, the global giant is moving into lifestyle businesses. It is adding new divisions including luxury gyms (Rise by We), private schools (WeGrow) and co-living ventures (WeLive). Since work and life bleed into one for so many… well, why not just live in We’s world?

That is very much the point; We is banking on shifting the aesthetic of work and life across the globe to their “coworking cool”. Still, when a significant number of its clients are now multinational businesses instead of scrappy start-ups, is it still the home of coworking, or just another office space provider?

We’ll see. The We Company is hurling toward a significant public listing, thanks to several massive cash injections. Although it is valued at $47bn, market analysts are sceptical whether it really has the financials – and stability – to back up such a number. Beyond having a business model that combines long-term leases on office buildings with short-term client agreements (“rent arbitrage”), We’s value is tied up in the gamble that global workers will embrace a whole new culture of work and life. It is a big bet.

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Image credit: Piero Zagami and Michela Nicchiotti.