WeWork: the latest news about 2019’s soap opera of a company – The Verge

The WeWork soap opera’s latest episode includes filing for bankruptcy

2023-11-06T23:04:34-05:00

Co-working office space provider WeWork has filed for bankruptcy covering its locations in the US and Canada, and in a filing, it said it had liabilities of between $10 and $50 billion.

It's the latest turn for a company that went from being valued at $47 billion in January 2019 to unsuccessfully attempting an IPO later that year.

Investors were unimpressed with a company that counted its founder and CEO, Adam Neumann, as a significant risk factor. Its fall was eventually captured in both a documentary for Hulu, WeWork: Or the Making and Breaking of a $47 Billion Unicorn, and the podcast-turned-TV show for Apple TV, WeCrashed.

As Elizabet …

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Jared Leto and Anne Hathaway will help Apple re-create the WeWork disaster for TV

2021-01-29T17:41:02-05:00

Apple's television adaptation of the podcast adaptation of the real-life soap opera that was WeWork now has some major talent attached. Jared Leto, the soon-to-be leading vampire of Morbius, and Anne Hathaway, are joining the Apple TV Plus series WeCrashed as Adam and Rebekah Neumann, according to The Hollywood Reporter.

WeCrashed takes its name from the Wondery podcast it's based on, detailing the meteoric rise and fall of the real estate company that billed itself as a technology company. Many of WeWork's problems (and, presumably, the plot of the show) were centered on the Neumanns. Adam Neumann was described as a risk factor in the S-1 …

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Go read this bonkers profile of Rebekah Neumann, co-founder of WeWork

2020-03-02T16:21:07-05:00

The business of business is rarely a pleasure, but sometimes it gets very juicy. Last year, the story of WeWork - its improbable rise and totally predictable downfall - was the juiciest: it had everything from a cult-leader, grifter chief exec to a laundry list of downright wild business practices (like leasing property directly from said grifter CEO). And what timing!

The document that sunk 'em was WeWork's bonkers S-1 filing, which precedes an initial public offering and which actually began with these utterly meaningless sentences: "We are a community company committed to maximum global impact. Our mission is to elevate the world's consc …

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WeWork’s fall is so wild that it’s getting a second TV series, this one for Apple

2020-02-27T20:33:34-05:00

WeWork was 2019's soap opera of a company, and its story was so wild that it will be the focus of a second TV series, Variety reports.

The second series will be developed by Apple and the showrunner of Apple TV Plus series Little America, according to Variety. (Disclosure: Little America is adapted from a series by Epic Magazine, which is owned by Vox Media, The Verge's parent company.) The series will be based on David Brown's WeCrashed podcast from the podcast network Wondery.

WeWork's story should make for good TV

Variety's report doesn't indicate when the series might be released. But if or when it does, WeWork's story should make for g …

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Ousted WeWork founder Adam Neumann lists his Manhattan penthouse for $37.5 million

2020-02-14T14:16:29-05:00

The last chapter of the WeWork saga closed with our hero - its founder, Adam Neumann - being ousted from his company (with a payout of $1.7 billion) and loosed upon the world. Its next chapter opened with a question: is the business sustainable? The answer is still unclear. Employees across WeWork are organizing in the face of massive potential layoffs, as the company began to divest itself of its "non-core" business; they couldn't get T-Mobile chief John Legere as their new CEO. In the midst of all this wreckage, which is slowly burning out, we've had a few Neumann sightings of our own. He was last seen jetting off to Israel two days before …

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John Legere reportedly won’t become WeWork’s next CEO

2019-11-15T17:10:15-05:00

Turning around the mess that is WeWork isn't going to be up to John Legere. According to CNBC, the current T-Mobile CEO does not intend to take the chief executive role, despite rumors earlier this week that WeWork was strongly pursuing him.

Legere "has no plans" to depart T-Mobile as it nears completion of its merger with Sprint, CNBC says. Both the Justice Department and Federal Communications Commission have greenlit the combined mega-carrier, but it still faces one final challenge: numerous state attorneys general are attempting to block the deal with a lawsuit.

Through his brash presentation style and a series of "Uncarrier" custome …

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WeWork is divesting itself from its ‘non-core businesses,’ including a wave pool company

2019-11-08T18:37:10-05:00

Earlier this week, SoftBank's Masayoshi Son said that it was a mistake to have invested in WeWork, and shared a "simple" three step plan to turn around the company, which included dumping side businesses that aren't profitable. Well, it seems like that might be happening soon, as WeWork has published a "90-day game plan" that divests itself of those non-core businesses and includes internal layoffs, as first reported by CNBC.

Here are the businesses that WeWork says it is going to get rid of. One is a company that makes wave pools.

Conductor, a digital marketing platform
Managed by Q, which makes software to help office teams hire service pr …

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WeWork’s workers are organizing

2019-11-08T11:46:15-05:00

WeWork - sorry, The We Company - is in freefall, and has been since its disastrous attempt to go public earlier this year. The co-working company's S-1 filing revealed a whole bunch of chicanery, mostly in service of enriching Adam Neumann, its founder and CEO. Neumann's bad behavior, however, has come with an immense human cost: he had thousands of employees beneath him, and after an emergency takeover by SoftBank, the company's largest investor, their livelihoods are now in jeopardy. (Neumann himself is walking away from the flaming wreckage with more than a billion dollars.) Because of that, some We Company employees have decided to band …

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SoftBank’s chairman admits he blew it with WeWork after disastrous earnings

2019-11-06T17:05:06-05:00

An actual slide from SoftBank’s earnings presentation. | Image: SoftBank

SoftBank leader Masayoshi Son admitted that it was a mistake to have invested in WeWork, the beleaguered office space rental company that's been in chaos ever since an attempt to go public revealed systemic mismanagement and ludicrous behavior by its founder and CEO.

During an earnings conference, Son said that WeWork's troubles resulted in "quite a large impact" on SoftBank and its Vision Fund. "My judgement in investment was not right in many ways," Son said, according to SoftBank's translator, adding that he regretted the decision.

"We believe that we will be able to have a big improvement in WeWork."

The remarks followed SoftBank postin …

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WeWork could be forming a gaming division

2019-11-01T14:02:23-04:00

WeWork has apparently started the process of making a gaming division, according to a trademark filing and job applications found by Bloomberg. WeWork has applied for a trademark for "Play By We" in the UK, and information in the trademark filing suggests the division could be e-sports-focused. As summarized by Bloomberg:

According to its trademark application, Play By We may offer entertainment services such as "providing online competitive, professional video games," including conducting contests, games, tournaments and exhibitions. The application also suggests the venture could provide facilities for video-gaming events, conferences, me …

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