WeWork的破产人尽皆知,似乎是一场公关灾难,任何一位经历过这种境况的高管都不可能东山再起,有一部电视剧和纪录片都记录了这家办公室租赁公司的崩溃。
今年8月15日,这种假设被证明是错误的,因为亿万富翁马克·安德森宣布计划对WeWork的创始人亚当·诺依曼新成立的房地产公司Flow进行一笔大规模投资。
据《纽约时报》(New York Times)报道,该笔投资价值3.5亿美元,是安德森的风投基金安德森-霍洛维茨(Andreessen Horowitz)史上最大手笔的单笔投资。安德森曾经投资Facebook的母公司Meta、推特(Twitter)和Skype等科技业巨头,这意味着他本次对Flow的投资具有极其重要的意义。
这笔最新投资使Flow的估值超过10亿美元。
WeWork在2019年破产,经过一次错综复杂的首次公开募股之后,其市值从400亿美元跌至今天的只有40亿美元。WeWork致力于通过转租联合办公空间掀起一场办公场所文化的革命。公司破产后便解除了诺依曼的首席执行官职务。
安德森于8月15日在其风投基金的网站上发表了一篇博客,宣布将投资诺依曼最新成立的公司。安德森表示,美国房地产行业的创新需要投资。博客开头称:“推动美国房地产市场发展的人口趋势不容忽视:美国人组建家庭的速度超过了我们建设房屋的速度。”
虽然目前关于Flow的业务和使命没有太多具体细节,但安德森称,该公司致力于打破对美国人目前的工作和生活方式有害的房地产开发模式。公司预计将在明年正式开始营业。
安德森在博客中表示,无论是买房还是租房,都无法满足大多数人的需求,而新冠疫情让这种困境变得更加复杂。他在文中提到了居家办公的兴起:“因此,[人们]将会体验到更少甚至体会不到任何办公室社交和本地工作者之间的友谊。”想必Flow就是为了弥补这种动态的不足。
安德森还在博客文章中提到了诺依曼在WeWork上的失败。他写道:“我们清楚创建这样一家公司的难度,而且我们喜欢看到人们能够总结以往的经验教训,在历史成绩的基础上,坚持创业。亚当取得了巨大成功,也有许多经验教训。我们很激动可以与他和他的同事携手再次踏上征途,塑造未来的生活模式。”
安德森在8月15日宣布投资决定的博客重点关注美国房地产市场的结构性问题,这与他在2020年所发表的一篇文章《房地产建设正当时》(It’s Time to Build)遥相呼应。安德森在那篇文章中呼吁美国增加房地产项目。
他指出:“在经济潜力激增的城市,我们几乎无法建设足够多的住房,这导致旧金山等地区的房价暴涨,让普通人未来几乎完全无法搬到这些城市就业。”他写道,解决方案是建设更多住房:通俗点说就是YIMBY(是的,在我的后院里)的心态。
本月早些时候,《大西洋》杂志(The Atlantic)爆料称,安德森实际上并没有坚持这种理念。该杂志曝光的公共文件显示,安德森和妻子反对在他们所生活的美国加利福尼亚州安瑟顿镇附近建设多户住宅。这座小镇已经连续五年被评为美国最富有的地区。(财富中文网)
译者:刘进龙
审校:汪皓
WeWork的破产人尽皆知,似乎是一场公关灾难,任何一位经历过这种境况的高管都不可能东山再起,有一部电视剧和纪录片都记录了这家办公室租赁公司的崩溃。
今年8月15日,这种假设被证明是错误的,因为亿万富翁马克·安德森宣布计划对WeWork的创始人亚当·诺依曼新成立的房地产公司Flow进行一笔大规模投资。
据《纽约时报》(New York Times)报道,该笔投资价值3.5亿美元,是安德森的风投基金安德森-霍洛维茨(Andreessen Horowitz)史上最大手笔的单笔投资。安德森曾经投资Facebook的母公司Meta、推特(Twitter)和Skype等科技业巨头,这意味着他本次对Flow的投资具有极其重要的意义。
这笔最新投资使Flow的估值超过10亿美元。
WeWork在2019年破产,经过一次错综复杂的首次公开募股之后,其市值从400亿美元跌至今天的只有40亿美元。WeWork致力于通过转租联合办公空间掀起一场办公场所文化的革命。公司破产后便解除了诺依曼的首席执行官职务。
安德森于8月15日在其风投基金的网站上发表了一篇博客,宣布将投资诺依曼最新成立的公司。安德森表示,美国房地产行业的创新需要投资。博客开头称:“推动美国房地产市场发展的人口趋势不容忽视:美国人组建家庭的速度超过了我们建设房屋的速度。”
虽然目前关于Flow的业务和使命没有太多具体细节,但安德森称,该公司致力于打破对美国人目前的工作和生活方式有害的房地产开发模式。公司预计将在明年正式开始营业。
安德森在博客中表示,无论是买房还是租房,都无法满足大多数人的需求,而新冠疫情让这种困境变得更加复杂。他在文中提到了居家办公的兴起:“因此,[人们]将会体验到更少甚至体会不到任何办公室社交和本地工作者之间的友谊。”想必Flow就是为了弥补这种动态的不足。
安德森还在博客文章中提到了诺依曼在WeWork上的失败。他写道:“我们清楚创建这样一家公司的难度,而且我们喜欢看到人们能够总结以往的经验教训,在历史成绩的基础上,坚持创业。亚当取得了巨大成功,也有许多经验教训。我们很激动可以与他和他的同事携手再次踏上征途,塑造未来的生活模式。”
安德森在8月15日宣布投资决定的博客重点关注美国房地产市场的结构性问题,这与他在2020年所发表的一篇文章《房地产建设正当时》(It’s Time to Build)遥相呼应。安德森在那篇文章中呼吁美国增加房地产项目。
他指出:“在经济潜力激增的城市,我们几乎无法建设足够多的住房,这导致旧金山等地区的房价暴涨,让普通人未来几乎完全无法搬到这些城市就业。”他写道,解决方案是建设更多住房:通俗点说就是YIMBY(是的,在我的后院里)的心态。
本月早些时候,《大西洋》杂志(The Atlantic)爆料称,安德森实际上并没有坚持这种理念。该杂志曝光的公共文件显示,安德森和妻子反对在他们所生活的美国加利福尼亚州安瑟顿镇附近建设多户住宅。这座小镇已经连续五年被评为美国最富有的地区。(财富中文网)
译者:刘进龙
审校:汪皓
WeWork’s famous implosion might seem like a PR nightmare that would be impossible for an executive to recover from, spawning both a TV series and documentary that chronicled the office leasing company’s failure.
On August 15, that assumption proved false when billionaire Marc Andreessen announced plans for a major investment in Flow, a new real estate company by WeWork founder Adam Neumann.
That investment is said to be worth $350 million, according to reporting by the New York Times, and represents the largest single investment that Andreessen’s venture capital firm, Andreessen Horowitz, has ever made. The billionaire’s investment history includes early stakes in tech giants like Facebook-parent Meta, Twitter, and Skype—meaning that his support of Flow has serious weight.
The latest investment set Flow’s valuation at over $1 billion.
WeWork collapsed in 2019, falling in value from over $40 billion to just $4 billion today after a complicated initial public offering. As it sputtered, the company, which aimed to revolutionize workplace culture via subleased coworking spaces, ousted Neumann as CEO.
Andreessen made his announcement about investing in Neumann’s latest company in a blog post on his firm’s website on August 15, citing the need for investment in innovation in the U.S. real estate sector. “The demographic trends driving America’s housing market are impossible to ignore: Our country is creating households faster than we’re building houses,” the post begins.
Though precise details about Flow’s business and mission are scarce, Andreessen implies that it aims to disrupt perceived harmful developments in how Americans currently work and live. The company is expected to launch next year.
Neither homeownership nor renting are currently able to meet most people’s needs, wrote Andreessen in his post, a predicament that COVID made more complicated. “As a result, [people] will experience much less, if any, of the in-office social bonding and friendships that local workers enjoy,” he wrote about the rise of working from home. Presumably, Flow is meant to remedy those dynamics.
In his post, Andreessen also addressed Neumann’s past failure with WeWork. “We understand how difficult it is to build something like this and we love seeing repeat-founders build on past successes by growing from lessons learned,” he wrote. “For Adam, the successes and lessons are plenty, and we are excited to go on this journey with him and his colleagues building the future of living.”
By focusing on structural problems in the American housing market, August 15’s investment announcement echoes a post Andreessen wrote in 2020 called “It’s Time to Build” in which he advocated for an increase in housing projects in the U.S.
“We can’t build nearly enough housing in our cities with surging economic potential—which results in crazily skyrocketing housing prices in places like San Francisco, making it nearly impossible for regular people to move in and take the jobs of the future,” he pointed out. The solution, he wrote, is to build more housing: a mindset colloquially known as YIMBY, or “yes in my backyard.”
Earlier this month, The Atlantic revealed that Andreessen does not actually adhere to that philosophy. The publication uncovered public documents showing him and his wife opposing the creation of multifamily dwelling units close to where they live in Atherton, Calif. The town has been named the richest zip code in the U.S. for five consecutive years.