WeWork-ing the company
Post-Neumann era dawns
The post-Adam Neumann era at WeWork has begun.
In the days since Neumann stepped down as chief executive, the company’s new leaders have moved to pare its headcount and assets, including friends and family members of Neumann and his wife, Rebekah, according to people familiar with the matter.
Overall, the ex-CEO’s replacements atop We Co., the shared-office company’s parent, are expected to trim thousands of positions from its staff of more than 12,000 and are looking to sell businesses outside its core leasing operation, sources said.
Their goal is to prepare a slimmed-down company for a public offering that would raise much-needed cash, likely next year.
The highest-placed executive among those expected to depart is Michael Gross, a vice chairman who has been a longtime ally and friend of Neumann’s.
Another exec slated to leave is Chris Hill, the company’s chief product officer who is also Rebekah Neumann’s brother-in-law, the people said.
Rebekah Neumann, a cofounder and chief brand and impact officer, is also departing, people familiar with the matter said this week.
Also out are some of the 10plus staffers who worked directly with Adam Neumann in a group that was referred to internally as the “oval office” and included some friends who worked on personal deals for him.
In stepping down as chief executive this week, Neumann also ceded majority control of the company after a tumultuous stretch in which We was forced to shelve a highly anticipated initial public offering when prospective investors balked at its sought-after valuation and governance.
That resistance helped galvanize support among Neumann’s fellow directors for a leadership change. He will remain non-executive chairman of the NewYork company.
We’s new co-chief executives, Artie Minson and Sebastian Gunningham, are planning to chart a new course for the formerly freewheeling company, which has grown rapidly but also generated steep losses.
It is a wide-ranging empire that Neumann sought to expand into an eclectic mix of businesses. They include preschool and elementary education unit WeGrow, a fitness club called Rise by We and a rental subsidiary for dorm-like apartments called WeLive. We spent over $500 million buying tech-related businesses including event-planning Web site Meetup.com and a search-engine optimization company, Conductor.
Assets slated for the auction block, people familiar with the matter said, include the company’s Gulfstream G650ER, a top-of-the-line private jet it bought last year for more than $60 million that Neumann and his family liked to use to zip between their homes in New York and California.