From a multibillion-dollar startup to bankruptcy, the speed of WeWork‘s ascent to the top echelons of the startup ecosystem has only been outpaced by its descent.
On Tuesday, WeWork filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in New Jersey, just over a decade since its launch.
Founded in 2010, WeWork quickly became one of the most valuable startups in the world, as well as the largest private tenant in New York. At its peak, it was worth $47 billion, having raised over $15 billion from investors including SoftBank, Benchmark and Hony Capital.
But in 2019, WeWork’s ambitions to go public revealed the extent of the company’s losses, forcing CEO Adam Neumann to step down and the IPO plans to be shelved. WeWork eventually went public in 2021 through a merger with blank check company BowX at an enterprise value of $9 billion.
Since then, the company has continued to struggle due to high levels of debt and the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, which forced WeWork to close locations that have never fully recovered. In March, it agreed to a restructuring plan with shareholders to reduce its net financial debt balance by $1.5 billion, which proved insufficient.
WeWork’s market cap has now fallen below $45 million and reports suggest that its lease obligations total over $10 billion. For H1 2023, the company reported a net loss of $696 million on revenues of about $1.7 billion.
Here’s how WeWork became one of the most celebrated startups in the world before crashing down.
Featured image of a WeWork coworking space in Shanghai by NurPhoto/Getty Images
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