This week’s deal is the culmination of a two-year saga to take WeWork public. When it last tried in 2019, WeWork was a giant in real estate and technology. The company, which rents office space, was one of the world’s most richly valued startups and the largest office tenant in its hometown of New York City, with locations around the globe.
Adam Neumann, the towering co-founder, had carefully polished the company’s image over nearly a decade, but the prospectus for WeWork’s initial public offering peeled the veneer right off. The filing for the company laid out a series of personal and professional conflicts for Neumann — apparent cases of nepotism, questionable loans and other controversial transactions — and mounting losses.
