As the pioneer of the global crowdmaker space model, WeWork only entered China in 2016. At that time, founder Adam Neumann personally came to WeWork on Yanping Road in Shanghai and shook hands with members: "Do what you love." Members are said to be enthusiastic, but even so, few people are optimistic about WeWork's development in the Chinese market. Continuing the American high-end rental and price model, the average monthly rent of WeWork workplaces exceeds 3,000 yuan, which is one-third higher than that of domestic peers.
Compared with the US market, the Chinese market is like a different time and space. American companies often have a "sense of confidence" and want to expand globally with a model, but the Chinese market seems to have a force field that can instantly transform any business model that comes across the ocean. Many companies abroad have well-functioning business models that seem no worse than their Chinese counterparts, but they all fail in China.
Although WeWork became the fifth largest unicorn in the world after being invested 4.40 billion US dollars by SoftBank, after more than a year of development, WeWork China only has 13 offices in Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong, while Ucommune, which was established 5 years later, has more than 100 co-working spaces in 30 cities across the country.
We have two options, we can implement the localization strategy ourselves, or ask a real China expert how to do it. "Adam chose the latter. In addition to choosing Hony Capital and Legend Holdings as its investors, on April 12 this year, WeWork acquired Naked Heart Society for 400 million US dollars (about 2.50 billion yuan) (read the Tiger Sniff article" How did Naked Heart Society "lose half"? "), and announced that it has officially signed a contract with Feng Group and Hony Investment to bring its personalized door-to-door customization and operation solution" Powered by We "to China.
It is understood that more than 30% of WeWork's new members in China belong to large enterprises (that is, companies with more than 1,000 employees). But not only WeWork, but also its competitors in China have completed a round of arms race: in January this year, Kr Space completed a 600 million yuan financing, which is known as the largest single financing record in the domestic co-working industry; after Ucommune completed the acquisition of three other major office spaces, it has deployed 160 co-working spaces in 35 cities, with a management area of more than 500,000 square meters.
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