HASdam Neumann will undoubtedly remain one of those shooting stars that have filled the galaxy of American start-ups for a good decade, sparkling brightly before being swallowed up in the black hole of harsh capitalist realities. At the start of 2019, the founder of the shared workspace rental company WeWork was still at the head of a company valued at $47 billion (€44 billion); its capitalization has fallen by 99% in one year and it is now worth only $57 million. In a few days, assure Wall Street Journalit should be placed under “Chapter 11” of the bankruptcy law, which allows a company to restructure to continue its activity.
The last blow came, Wednesday 1er November, from the rating agency Standard & Poor’s, which placed WeWork ” at bay “ in the category “partial defect”. The group in fact announced its inability to honor, at the beginning of October and then at the beginning of November, a tranche of interest payments on its debt of 2.9 billion dollars.
In August, he had already warned the Securities and Exchange Commission, the American stock market watchdog, that“there is substantial doubt about the company’s ability to continue as a going concern”reshuffling its board of directors to bring in four specialists in financial restructuring.
Accumulation of vacant premises
Created in 2010 and formerly in the firmament of start-ups, WeWork had raised funds, notably from SoftBank, its largest shareholder. But before putting $8 billion into the pot, in 2019, the Japanese group ousted Mr. Neumann: the man had thought too big and his accounting escapades had frightened investors. The founding boss of Softbank, Masayoshi Son, nonetheless remained “convinced that the world of work is radically changing” and “WeWork is at the forefront of this revolution “. Stainless optimism until the Covid-19 crisis emptied the offices.
The business model of the company, which has 777 sites in 39 countries, has not proven itself: signing long-term leases, particularly in business centers like New York, London, Paris or Tokyo, before renting the furnished spaces to companies under flexible contracts, which are easier to terminate, exposes WeWork to the risk of an accumulation of vacant premises. However, coworking has not been as attractive as WeWork managers expected. In France, for example, it only concerns 7% of workers, the overwhelming majority having a strong need for social relations in the office, indicates the 2023 survey of the Actineo observatory.
You have 15% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.