So IWG plc, which has a British stock-market listing and does business mostly as Regus, had 2018 revenue of £2.5 billion and a current market cap of about £3 billion.
It thus trades at about 1.2x annual revenue. WeWork's multiple is way higher.
WeWorks multiple is irrelevant when it is losing money every quarter. This current era is redolent of the dying embers of the dot com boom - over leveraged loss makers trying to go public to pay back vast sums of borrowing from investors
This gets tricky. Yes, some loss-making businesses never turn profitable. But others do (i.e. Amazon). And when it comes to real-estate companies, the rather goofy U.S. tax rules mean that even quite robust companies will engineer huge depreciation losses when they actually are doing fine.
WeWork might still be way overvalued in the private markets. But it could also be a lot healthier than its reported losses.
I'm curious what Regus' take is on WeWork (i.e. strategy).
In other words, did they start a hip new WeWork-killer? Attempt to compete on price? Have special retention marketing campaigns to stave off clients from going to WeWork.
Interesting, I did not know Spaces was under IWG! They are here in DC as well. Materially the office space is the same offering as WeWork, but there is a noticeably different vibe/sheen that is hard to pin down. Neither appeals to me as I find it hard to focus / get work done in coworking places like this, but WeWork just feels better executed / 'cooler' at first blush.
I've only been to WeWork in London, yes I agree the vibe is a little different. You could argue they're both faking it being hip but WeWork does a slightly more convincing job while Spaces feels bit more corporate.
That said, I found the WeWork in London extremely noisy and tight compared to my current space. It might be just a side effect of real estate prices in respective cities, though.
I've been to that Spaces Noma in DC many times, and I immediately said to my coworker that it was a "cheap imitation of WeWork". The same entrepreneurs in glass cages concept, the same barista upfront, but without any real originality. I don't like the WeWork vibe but at least there's some original thought going into it. Spaces is just an imitation, but you know what, does it matter? From a business perspective, immitation is the sincerest form of flattery, even if it feels like a cheap imitation.
