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WeWork has already expanded its business lines, from managing workspaces to fashion for entrepreneurs to overseeing shared facilities, schools, gyms, and more.
Now, the company is preparing to become a manufacturer of glass and aluminum parts used in its characteristic interiors, with a 200,000-square-foot facility 35 miles from its New York City headquarters.
The company is looking to hire at least 50 people to fill positions ranging from furnace operator to manufacturing manager in Edison, New Jersey, according to the latest job postings on LinkedIn. New employees will be working in new facilities with state-of-the-art equipment, based on job opportunities. The aesthetics of the company relies mainly on glass and aluminum to partition the rooms.
The shift to manufacturing is a major focus of WeWork's positioning as a technology company specializing in real estate. Construction of manufacturing plant comes as parent company WeWork The We Company prepares to go public, a heated process that raises questions about the company's leadership, conflicts of interest and the basic business model .
The company has attempted to create partnerships with the owners rather than signing long-term conventional leases. She also indicated that helping other companies design office space could be a way to reduce significant losses.
See more: WeWork leads the way in profitability – and most of its options involve slowing down its dizzying growth
The WeWork spokeswoman declined to comment, citing the company's calm period before its initial public offering.
Last month, the company's deposit by its company before its IPO signaled its desire to reduce costs through "vertical integration".
"In recent years, we have been able to optimize our capital expenditures through a combination of greater economies of scale resulting from the growing size of our global network, the vertical integration of our design and construction processes. and the increased use of technology. "
A handful of large real estate developers have tried to better control their supply chain and reduce their costs by owning manufacturing plants. Related Companies, which develops the New York district Hudson Yards, has built a wall manufacturer in Linwood, Pennsylvania.
This practice is rare for flexible office providers such as WeWork, which has adopted an approach to its business that uses more assets than its peers. Anxious to own buildings instead of renting them, the company began creating a private equity fund in 2017 and eventually integrated the fund into an investment platform called ARK this spring.
The CEO of Knotel, a flexible office provider who raised $ 400 million last month with a valuation of $ 1.3 billion, said the move from WeWork to manufacturing was unusual. Amol Sarva told Business Insider that "if you are in traditional real estate, it makes sense". A developer such as Related, for example, can make his supply chain more efficient by owning a factory and overseeing production instead of buying materials.
See more: Mutual funds like Fidelity's famous Contrafund fund slashed valuations of WeWork holdings
Sarva said he was focusing on innovation in other areas of design and construction, which he said is ripe for a general transformation.
"All office activities have been spared by the weather," he said.
But instead of changing the manufacturing process as WeWork is trying to do, Sarva said it was focusing on reducing the amount of waste generated by office building.
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