- Shared workplace giant WeWork is reportedly going to go public this September, which is ahead of schedule according to sources with The Wall Street Journal.
WeWork — the shared workplace giant — is reportedly preparing to go public this September, according to a report by The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) this week. This report comes on the heels of another recent report from The Wall Street Journal that claims WeWork CEO Adam Neumann cashing out more than $700 million the company — which was made through a combination of stock sales and loans secured from his equity in the company. This is an unusual step since founders wait until after a company goes public to cash out on shares.
Neumann is setting up a family office for investing the proceeds from this sale. And Neumann has also hired financial talent to help run it including former Ilan Stern — who previously worked at General Catalyst and Soros Fund Management. The family office is reportedly called 166 2nd Financial Services.
Plus Neumann also made a number of real estate purchases in New York and San Francisco including four homes in the New York area and a $21 million 13,000-square-foot house in California featuring a guitar-shaped room. In total, Neumann reportedly spent about $80 million on real estate. He has also invested in several startups including Hometalk, EquityBee, Intercure, Selina, Tunity, and Pins.
The We Company (WeWork’s parent company) is likely going to unveil an S-1 filing next month before going public. As of the company’s last round of funding, The We Company hit a valuation of $47 billion. And the WSJ’s sources said that The We Company is already meeting with Wall Street banks for securing an asset-backed loan upwards of $6 billion.
In terms of the numbers, WeWork revealed that it saw 2018 net losses of $1.9 billion as of March on revenue of $1.82 billion. By extrapolating these numbers, Business Insider pointed out that WeWork lost $219,000 every hour in 2018. In 2017, The We Company saw a net loss of $933 million on revenue of $886 million. Originally, The We Company was reportedly expecting to go public in December. And WeWork saw a 90% occupancy rate in 2018 and the membership totals increased 116% to 401,000, according to TechCrunch.
Since launching in 2011, The We Company has raised $8.4 billion in a combination of debt and equity funding. And the company’s IPO is expected to be the second largest of the year following Uber — which was valued at more than $80 billion following the IPO on the New York Stock Exchange.
