WeWork

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WeWork (WE): Company Profile, Stock Price, News, Rankings

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WeWork | Fortune

WeWork (WE): Company Profile, Stock Price, News, Rankings | Fortune

Dylan Sloan

Deflated ‘unicorn’ CEO Adam Neumann surrenders after judge kills his attempt to buy back WeWork

/2024/05/28/wework-flow-adam-neumann-bankruptcy-judge-chapter-11-flow/

Orianna Rosa Royle

Jeff Bezos recently gave Adam Neumann some leadership advice—and it’s already changing how he runs his company, says ex-WeWork founder

/2024/05/10/jeff-bezos-wework-adam-neumann-advice/

Eleanor Pringle

Adam Neumann wants WeWork back—and he’s reportedly launched an offer of more than $500 million to get it

/2024/03/26/adam-neumann-wework-finance-bid-return/

Devon Pendleton

Daniel Cancel

Bloomberg

VC billionaire Marcelo Claure is all in on AI, Shein and his hit soccer club—and wishes people would stop bringing up Adam Neumann and WeWork

/2024/02/29/vc-billionaire-marcelo-claure-interview-wework-adam-neumann/

Marco Quiroz-Gutierrez

5 years after getting ousted from WeWork, former CEO Adam Neumann tries to buy his former company out of bankruptcy

/2024/02/06/adam-neumann-flow-wants-to-buy-wework/

Adam Neumann wants WeWork back—and he's reportedly launched an offer of more than $500 million to get it

https://fortune.com/2024/03/26/adam-neumann-wework-finance-bid-return/?itm_source=parsely-api

Adam Neumann, Founder, Flow; Co-Founder and Former CEO, WeWork In conversation with: Michal Lev-Ram, FORTUNE

Brainstorm Tech 2023: Go With The Flow 

Conferences

We're going to keep moving along. Our next guest has redefined many boundaries, brick mortar and then some seven years ago, he made his debut on our stage when his fast growing and much hype company was rumored to go public and I think we probably all followed the roller coaster ride of what happened next. Adam Newman is the co founder of wework, a company that pioneered the concept of co working reconfigured the workplace landscape. Adam stepped down as CEO of the company in 2019 after we worked out to shelve plans for an IPO and now Adam is on a new journey. His current mission is to transform the soulless experience of renting, find a solution for America's fractured housing market. So to talk past, present and future, please welcome back to brainstorm tech's. Adam Newman have a bit. Um Adam, thank you for joining us. I'm going to start with a very basic question, but I think one that probably a lot of people are wondering and that's just why are you here? You know, obviously we invited you to come speak. That's part of the reason, but I want to know why are you back in front of this particular audience. And why are you at it again with another company? I think first of all, thank you for having me. And always nice to see a great face in the audience. And Park City is beautiful. I've never been here in the summer. It's unbelievable. Very nice to see. I think in life, we go through many journeys and as we go through these journeys, we have different lessons that we learn. But if we learned our lessons and we don't get a chance to do it again, then I don't think you can really apply it. And I think when things happen in your life, if you took time to think about it and learn from it and then you apply it, that's a great journey. But if you actually did learn from it and you stopped and something happened, it becomes a tragedy. So I'm here because I love entrepreneurship. And I think this category and this problem is real and we're excited to do our part in trying to solve it. So we're going to get into flow and what you're doing with it today, what your hopes are. But I want to talk about those lessons learned first of all and just ask you, you know, you've had quite a bit of distance and time now from wework. I looking back with the space that you have and the perspective, what do you think were the biggest mistakes? What are the biggest learnings that you take with you today. So when I stepped down in 2019, I actually took the time to think a lot and had a great team around me that were able to talk and discuss all the different things and there are many lessons. But first of all, I would say I'm extremely proud in what we did and we work, I'm proud of the team. We, today we work has over 700 locations. It's in 39 countries, it's in over 70 languages. And I don't think there's a person on the planet who is building a new office space today, who's not thinking what would or wouldn't we work? Think so. I think that part is great as far as the lessons and there are many and we don't have enough time today. This is a short interview, but I'll focus, I'll focus on two that come to mind right now. One as an entrepreneur, there are many things you don't control. One of the only things you control is who you surround yourself with and not just who you surround yourself with. But exactly what kind of people they are. I think in we work, we're surrounded by very smart people, but moving forward, what I surround myself is not just very smart people, but also people are very comfortable telling me what they think. And when you need to tell someone what you think and they don't agree with you, you need to have the courage and you need to be empowered to go back again and say it again and again and again. So my first lesson surround yourself, not only with the best people and the smartest people, but also the ones who are going to tell you what they think. And it means if you don't listen, they're going to keep at it until you either never see them again or until you agree. That's one, the second one is listening. The first lesson doesn't work without the second one. After when I stepped down from my work, I had the opportunity to become an investor and our family offices invested in over 50 different companies. And I got to be the investor giving the entrepreneur advice and seeing that the entrepreneur is not listening and getting a little frustrated until I realized that maybe this is part of how I used to act. And I realized that part of being a great entrepreneur is not just listening, but listening to the hard truth, listening to the things you don't want, they have to choose to choose who you surround yourself with and become a great listener and great listeners like to listen to what they don't want to hear, not what they want to hear. So do you if I'm to like put all that together? Do you think that your investor at the time at wework could have played a larger role in not helping to create what was a spectacular rise and then a spectacular fall. I mean, what was your role there? And what was your investor's role? Again, as I said before, I am so proud of what we did in Monday night's quarterbacking. Is that what you call and doing that now with the investors and what they should have done? I can tell you one thing, no one from the outside ever knows what happens on the inside. And again, I think very few people disrupt categories and very few companies reinvent categories. Office is the second largest category in the world. And I'm very proud of what was achieved. Ok, I want to ask you about um my understanding is that there were, there were several components of your exit package which was controversial at the time. Um But one of those components was also a non compete agreement. And when does that expire? Our non compete expired? It's actually noncompeting and unsolicited and that expires October 30th of this year. Ok. So what happens then does this mean that you with your new company which we will get to in a second compete with? We work to answer that question. I would have to explain what flow is because I think the answer is slightly more complex. So for those of you who don't know flo is building a, I heard the mission, you said before, I'm not sure that's actually our mission, but it sounded interesting correct that. So good. So good. We're not ready to come up with that yet, but flo is building a consumer facing residential brand and we're doing it through integrating technology community and a world class operating team that puts the resident first. And just some numbers for those of you who don't know, 66% of young adults in this country are renters and they spend 34% of their total income on rent. And yet there's no rent, no promise, no elevated experience in in the past Howard Schultz, who was a great entrepreneur and also a company that I really admire came up with the concept of the third place. He would say the first place was the home. The second place was the office and the third place was Starbucks where you could get a cup of coffee, meet someone and be surrounded by other people. I think in a pre Corona world that was amazing. I think in a post Corona world, what Flo is observed is that it's not anymore the first place or the third place. It's the one place and in the one place, you have to integrate everything our residents, which we survey regularly. 70% of them spend between 2 to 5 days working from home in a reality where work from home and living has become one a place where our home is changed and our relationship to our home has changed. I don't think a lot of us think there's anything more important than that. The new solution for the future of living needs to be more the one place as opposed to the first or the third. And that's what flow is going to do. To answer your question. You said is flow. I think what you're asking is what's flo going to do well and does flow, where does, where does we work end? And where does flow begin? And where do they dovetail? Compete? So you're asking is flow going to compete? I think with not, I think I know in a world where the one place is the new solution where work and living has been integrated, we're not ready actually for these solutions because these buildings have not been designed for that. The operating systems are not there, the tech is not there, the teams are not there to run it. I think flow has only two choices, compete or partner. OK. So compete is one of the choices comp is one of the choices or partner. OK. All right. Well, maybe it would help if you, you know, I think we get kind of the philosophy and the need in the, in the market that you see for flow. But give us a bit more of a concrete breakdown of what is the business model? Do you own these buildings or not necessarily? And how does the company make money? So I'm going to add one more thing and then I'm going to answer that. In May, the surgeon general came up with a study defining loneliness as an epidemic in the United States. He was saying that it's going to cause loneliness, it's going to cause mental illnesses, it's going to cause early death. He was giving all these different definitions and quoting tremendous amount of study. We live in a world where we're so connected. We've never been more disconnected even though we love technology and flow is tech first and product. First, we use technology as a tool to achieve the mission and the goals that we have not as the end goal. And with that in mind, it has to all be brought together perfectly. So we think the best way to do that business model, we own 3000 apartments that we're running. We have over 150 employees and a majority of engineers, product designers, both digital and physical. We're actually looking for a lot more great employees. And the business model that we have is a vertically integrated system. We own the buildings, we operate the buildings, we build the technology, we build a community and we build the teams that are running them. And when you bring all of that together, the moment a resident is happier, more fulfilled and stays longer. The buildings churns goes down, churn is the amount of times people leave a building and the building is immediately more profitable. Happier residents more fulfilled residents equals more profitable buildings. We've already proven this on our first two buildings. And this is something that in real estate you don't see often because real estate is not treated as a consumer product. Even though it really is. The reason it's not treated as a consumer product is because it's a supply challenge, not a demand challenge. You raised $100 million from Mark Andreesen. Correct. No, no. Sorry how much? Um, 350 million, excuse me, I should have looked at my notes. 350 million. That's even more mind boggling. I want to hear about just very briefly, tell us about just why you think this is a good match. And Dr Horowitz and, and you, and also curious to hear, you know, not everybody gets a second chance and not on this kind of level, of course, 3 50 million. Um Why do you think Mark believed in you and wanted to put his money in you? So a few things first, we spoke about lessons learned and we said one of them is surround yourself with the right people. Mark and Ben and A 16 Z are unbelievable investors. They're actually investors who started as entrepreneurs, they run multiple businesses and created multiple businesses when they're in the boardroom and we're discussing, not only is no one holding anything back, the kind of advice we're getting has a lot to do with building a long term business also. And this is something amazing about Mark. After our first board meeting, Mark called me the next day and he goes, Adam, I wanted to give you some feedback about something I heard in the board meeting. And I said, of course. And then he gave me the list of all the things that he disagrees with. Not the things he said in the board meeting with. There are a lot of other things that he thought about afterwards and he said, I don't want to come too hard, but that's what I think. And I said, Mark the deal we made when we did this deal is that you always tell me exactly what you think and I will do my best to be a great listener. And that's been the relationship ever since they've turned out to be even greater partners than I would imagine specifically to what you're asking. I am sure there are people who deserve to get investments more than me. I am sure there's a lot of people who deserve, who don't get it. And I hope because I really believe in entrepreneurship that the people who deserve to get this investment will get it because I also think that to build the future, we need start ups and we need innovation. And that's what this conference is all about. I think it shouldn't matter what race they come from, what gender they come from, where they come from. Nothing should matter and everybody should get their opportunity specifically why I got the second chance that you should ask a six OK. Question from the audience. Please raise your hand. We'll bring a mic over to you quickly. We've got one right here, Mark Johnson CTO. Stand together. Um Sorry, what's your regulatory barriers? Do you think you're going to face in building flow? So great question. There's a lot of basic things in residential real estate that are already a effect. So we have to follow all the rules that exist. It's actually a very advanced category when it comes to that. But a very early category when it comes to actual innovation or technology or giving a new experience, whatever they are, we take them extremely seriously, but they change between state to state and it depends if you're owning the building, building, the building, operating the building and then flow starts there. But over time probably grows outside of these multi family buildings. There's tremendous opportunity to where this brand can go to. Do you do you by the way? Um I know one of the knocks um after this one was, was published um was in how you described the company and earlier on too, you know, the fact that um the valuation was where it was and that uh you know, there was yes there was tech involved, but it was real estate. Are you comfortable today? Describing flow as a real estate company or what is it, what category is it in. I can't answer the end without answering the beginning. I'm a little bored of talking about the past. But if, if we must, our valuation was given by the most sophisticated values in the world. It was Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley, it was Softbank and Benchmark and all the other investors that are considered the best investors in the world. So when people knock our valuation, they're really knocking all the people who gave that valuation evaluation is something that's given by a person that wants to actually invest the money. Putting that aside. We used to describe we were many different ways, flow is very comfortable being a residential consumer facing real estate company. It is the largest asset class in the world. It has no brand that we know of and prop tech in that category is still very early because whenever you solve these problems, everyone is solving them as a single point problem as opposed to actually solving them as a vertical integration problem. So the way we're going after it is going to take longer, we're going to have to build a very solid foundation. But when we do, I think our solution is going to actually help solve problems like loneliness community. And I'll say one more thing. And I think we live in this world today where I'm not sure we need more followers. I think we need more friends and I think we can all appreciate a lot more face to face interaction and maybe a little less face time. Well, Adam, we appreciate you coming, getting dressed up for us, no T shirts today. Um But thank you so much for coming and looking forward to seeing what you do with flow. Thank you for having me.

[MUSIC PLAYING] ANDREW NUSCA: You've got a lot of customers, a lot of different kinds of customers. Could you talk about that a little bit? And try, again, let's try to ground this a little bit. Why do people come to you? ADAM NEUMANN: So we like to call them members, not customers. So if you're to-- you can be any one of the above. If you're starting a business, you're one person. You're by yourself. ANDREW NUSCA: Sure. ADAM NEUMANN: It's a hard thing to do. Anybody here who's started a business knows it's very difficult. First thing you need to-- what is my business? Who is funding me? Where am I getting my sales? Who is going to work with me? There are 1,000 questions you need to ask. You come into WeWork. You take a space for $600 a month, and you're already part of a community. You have at least 1,000 other people around you that are ready to help. And because you're all part of the same thing, they're actually excited to do-- to be that. And that's on the smallest level. On the largest level, you might be Salesforce. You might be Facebook. You might be Dell. And you have HQs, headquarters all over the world. You have satellite offices all over the world. And you need these-- you need a solution that's better than just the old way that people used to do it when they build a global business. They might need us also. ANDREW NUSCA: They're coming to you for culture, do you think? Facebook, for example, very kind of well-known culture. We talked about-- I talked with Diane Greene earlier about Google's culture. They come to you because they want different culture, better culture? ADAM NEUMANN: Corporate America in general has a cultural challenge today. And you know it if you just need a churn of employees that are younger than 30. If you just saw all the different things that are happening in the different organizations, you would know that culture America-- culture today in corporate America is a very big deal. Do we give you the culture? We can't, because if you don't have a mission-driven business, we can create a mission for you. But if you have a mission-driven business, then we can help talk about it. We can help make sure that it's communicated, not just through your words and not just to your investors, but also, how does your space feel? What is it all about? Are you part of something greater than yourself? And that, we can help large or small companies with. ANDREW NUSCA: And I felt that. So I visited you folks in one of your New York offices. The culture of WeWork is pretty-- the kind of culture that WeWork has on display is pretty well known. You've got beer taps. You've got fancy offices. You've got small, individual desks. You've got walled-off glass desks. There's a lot of diversity in what you're offering these companies. Why wouldn't they just copy all of the aesthetics? Why wouldn't they install a beer tap in their hallway and put all-glass offices-- it's so in vogue, right? Yeah, let's open office the heck out of our company. REBEKAH NEUMANN: So I think the one thing is you're focusing a little bit on the physical, which is also very important. And a lot of time has been put into that. Our co-founder, Miguel McKelvey, who's a brilliant designer and architect, has helped really kind of mastermind what our spaces look like. But I think you have to take it back a few steps. Adam grew up on a kibbutz, Miguel in a commune with only moms. All the dads took off. And I grew up in New York-- it's not as exciting-- but kind of studying spirituality, Buddhism, yoga, what have you, my entire life. And it's the cross-section of our backgrounds and our interests that I think have kind of led to the ethos and mission of this company. And I think when members come in, they might be looking for free beer or coffee or an office or someone to collaborate with. But once they spend some time, they actually see that there's another energy that's happening there, which is leading to another level of fulfillment and success. And being able to lean on other people who will support you, and who are rooting for you, and who are working all hours of the night, and who understand what it is to wear multiple hats and do multiple things and have many trades, I think that's creating something really meaningful for them. [MUSIC PLAYING]

Insights: WeWork Founders: Community is Our Business

WeWork Founders: Community is Our Business

Uncategorized

Cofounders stress the uniqueness of the culture. 

Cofounders Rebekah Neumann and Adam Neumann stress the uniqueness of their community's culture. 

2019 IPO market was solid, despite some big flops

Briefing

Companies going public learned an important lesson for 2020.

And companies looking to go public learned an important lesson for 2020.

 Rebekah, when you think about leadership, what is the single most important trait that you think makes a great leader? A great leader, first and foremost, is a great person and a great human being, someone that has a lot of morals, integrity, someone that values their family, that's loyal, that's truthful, and that approaches life with a deep respect for these sorts of things. You have to bring that to the office first. And then, you can get into everything else that's happening in the workplace. To be a great leader, you first have to be a great follower. To be a great leader, after you know how to be a great follower, you have to lead by example. And then, if that example is a meaningful one, people will follow. Adam, how did you learn about how to lead other people? I mean, you didn't even really have much business experience when you started your company. Serving in the army teaches you leadership. I was an officer in the Israeli Navy. I learned-- by the time I was 19, I had 20 soldiers and sometimes I would manage a boat that cost more than half a billion dollars. A lot of responsibility at a very young age. So I did have that experience. Business wise, I truly only started understanding what it is to run a business after I met Rebekah. I genuinely thought it was about making money, and if I could lead my team to all make money, they will be happy and their investors will be happy. Rebekah met me and said, Adam, I'm sorry, you're confused. It's about bringing meaning and intention to the world. It's about doing what you love, bringing intention, connecting the two. And she said, I promise you, the rest will follow, money will follow, and everything will work itself out. So Rebekah, where did you learn that wisdom about leadership? My brother passed when I was 11 years old and I very quickly came to understand what is meaningful in life. And I just don't think you can separate life from work. I think what's meaningful in life is what's meaningful in the workplace. And what we're seeing now with the We generation is everybody wants to live a more meaningful life, be more happy and fulfilled. So it sounds like some of it, in your case, Adam, was trial by error. A lot. OK. So what was the biggest mistake that you made along the way and what was the leadership lesson that you learned from it? I make mistakes all the time. Being open minded to them, giving your team, your fellow members, your husbands, your wife the opportunity to point them out to you. And being open minded enough to not taking it personally, but growing from it, is the best way that I've dealt with mistakes. And you have a lot of millennials working inside the WeWork organization and how do you teach them about leadership? How do you mentor them? It's really about setting an example and doing it but mainly every time I make a mistake, admitting it in front of a large group of people, learning from it, and, then, doing something different next time. Showing that there's always room to grow. Another part of leadership is also encouraging people to try new and innovative things, to be innovators. How are you getting that message across that people are willing to take risks, willing to fail, rather than just sticking with the safe way of doing things? It's only OK to fail if the reasons you did it to begin with was not to grow your own ego but actually to elevate the organization. If, after you failed, you learn from it, and you'll teach others, then it's OK. Rebekah, as you look back on your life, both personal and professional, what would you say was the best leadership advice that you ever received? And why did it shape you as a leader? We all know Gandhi's quote, "Be the change you wish to see in the world." I really think that's the best thing I can bring forth as a leader is to be as authentically on brand-- and when I say on brand for WeWork that means a really good person who really cares about people who's really tenacious about my work and who's super grateful for all of our blessings-- to actually try to everyday be those things. And I think that's the best way that I can help them. How about you, Adam? Don't demand respect. Respect is earned based on actions. If you don't feel that people are listening to you, look inside. You don't have a bad team, you don't have bad people around you, you're being a bad leader. Grow. Every time something doesn't work my way, instead of pointing fingers, I try to look inside. Sometimes I still make the mistake and point fingers and at night before I go to sleep, I think of it then and say, ah, I missed on that one. Tomorrow, I'll go back to that person, apologize that I got upset, and actually look inside and find a better way to be a better leader. 

WeWork CEO: 'Do Not Demand Respect'

Leadership

Cofounders Rebekah and Adam Neumann talk lessons in leadership.

Rebecca. When you think about leadership, what is the single most important trait that you think makes a great leader a great leader? First and foremost is a great person and a great human being. Someone that has a lot of morals, integrity, someone that values their family that's loyal. That's truthful and that approaches life with deep respect for these sorts of things. You have to bring that to the lawlessness first, and then you can get into everything else was happening in the workplace. To be a great leader, you first have to be a great follower to be a great leader after you know how to be grateful. Er, you have to live by example. And then if that example is a meaningful one, people will follow. Adam, how did you learn about how to lead other people? And you didn't really have much business experience when you started your company? Serving in the Army teaches your leadership. I was an officer in the Israeli navy. I learned by the time I was 1920 soldiers and sometimes it would manage a boat that costs more than half a $1,000,000,000 a lot of responsibility at a very young age. I did have that experience. Business wise. I truly only started understanding what it is to run a business. After I met Rebecca, I genuinely thought was about making money. And if I could lead my team to all make money, they will be happy and the investors will be happy. Rebecca met me and said that I'm I'm sorry you're confused about bringing meaning and intention to the world. It's about doing what you love bringing intention, connecting the two. And she said, I promise you the rest will follow. Money will follow and everything will work itself out. Rebecca, where did you learn that wisdom about leadership? My brother passed when I was 11 years old, and I very quickly came to understand what is meaningful in life. And I just don't think you can separate life from work. I think what's meaningful in life is meaningful in the workplace. And what we're seeing now with the regeneration is everybody wants to live a more meaningful like be more happy and fulfilled. So it sounds like some of it. Your case Adam Waas trial by error and okay, so what was the biggest mistake that you made along the way. And what was the leadership lesson that you learned from it? I make mistakes all the time, being open minded to them, giving your team your fellow members, your husband, your wife, the opportunity to point them out to you and being open minded enough to not taking it firstly, but growing from it is the best way that I've dealt with mistakes. You have a lot of millennials working inside the we work organization. And how do you teach them about leadership? How do you mentor them? It's really about setting an example in doing it mainly every time I make a mistake, admitting it in front of a large group of people learning from it and then bring something different next time, showing that there's always room to grow. Another part of leadership is also encouraging people to try new and innovative things to the innovators. How are you getting that message across that people are willing to take risks, willing to fail rather than just sticking with safe way of doing things? It's on Lee okay to fail if the reasons you did it to begin with was not to grow your ego, but actually to elevate organization. If, after you failed, you learn from it and you'll teach others, then it's OK. We're back and you look back on your life both personal and professional. What would you say was the best leadership advice that you ever received? And why did it shape you as a leader that we all know? Gandhi's quote be the change you wish to see in the world? I really think that's the best thing I could bring forth is the leader is to be as authentically on Brand. And when I say on brand for we work, that means a really good person who really cares about people who's really tenacious about my work and who's super grateful for all of our blessings to actually try to every day be those things. And I think that's the best way that I can help them. How about you, Adam? Don't demand respect. Respect is earned based on action. If you don't feel that people are listening to you. Look inside. You don't have a bad team. You don't have bad people around you. You're being a bad leader. Go every time something doesn't work. My way. Instead of pointing fingers, I tried to look inside. Sometimes they still make them steak and point fingers in the night Before I go to sleep, I think of the dance I missed on that one tomorrow, go back, that person apologize that I got upset and actually look inside and find a better way to be a better leader.

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