WeWork Joins Rush of Tech Companies Into Office Software

WeWork executives say Workplace will assist companies lure employees again to workplaces by giving their staff an app with which they’ll do things like e book a convention room, put up an organization announcement or register for a yoga class.

“Companies of all sizes recognize that people aren’t coming in every day,” mentioned

Scott Morey,

WeWork’s president of expertise and innovation. That sea change within the office has created challenges that require digital options, he mentioned.

But WeWork isn’t alone in on the lookout for new enterprise alternatives within the upheaval within the office-space business attributable to the pandemic. Competitors additionally providing a variety of apps, information, telecommunications and different software program embrace expertise firms equivalent to

Cisco Systems Inc.

and

Honeywell International Inc.

and startups equivalent to VTS and HqO.

“The race is still early,” Mr. Morey mentioned.

In the early levels of the pandemic, tech firms raced to assist companies address well being, security and telecommunication programs as staff shifted nearly in a single day to working from house. For instance, beer-brewing firm

Heineken

NV used HqO’s workplace app to take care of a secure stage of occupancy and preserve social distancing, mentioned

Stephan Ottenhoff,

a digital and expertise supervisor at Heineken within the Netherlands.

More just lately, tech firms have been attempting to assist companies and landlords cope with the gradual reopening of conventional workplaces. Most companies have adopted hybrid methods combining workplace work and distant work which have required administration groups to rethink convention rooms, design, safety, scheduling, meals, air high quality and different workplace wants.

Cisco is attempting to faucet into this demand with a palette of providers together with its teleconferencing system that cancels background sounds and a space-management instrument that tracks worker utilization of convention rooms and different workplace house. Cisco has added all these applied sciences to its New York workplaces, which it makes use of as a showcase for promoting these providers.

Honeywell,

in the meantime, has tried to seize market share with software program equivalent to People Counting, a instrument that analyzes video from safety cameras to maintain a real-time log of how many individuals go out and in of the workplace.

Other tech firms are serving to companies and landlords persuade staff to return to workplaces, one thing many are loath to do after greater than two years of settling into distant life. Office apps and accompanying information instruments are designed to assist overcome this resistance by making the office extra enjoyable, environment friendly and secure.

The measurement of the office-software enterprise is troublesome to gauge partly as a result of it’s so younger, however members estimate that it’s within the billions of {dollars}.

WeWork’s rollout of its workplace-software service marks the newest chapter within the saga of the corporate. WeWork shook up the office-space enterprise within the years main as much as the pandemic, however a deliberate preliminary public providing in 2019 flopped spectacularly.

Since then, a brand new administration workforce has reduce prices by shedding quite a few leases. Last October, WeWork went public by way of a merger with a special-purpose acquisition firm.

But the corporate’s inventory, which hit a excessive of $13.18 in October, has fallen to beneath $5 a share partly as a result of the corporate continues to function at a loss and remains to be on the hook for a $2.4 billion load of debt, due in 2025, analysts say.

Some analysts don’t count on WeWork’s new workplace-software providing to be a lot assist.

“It seems to be a diversion, more than anything else, away from what is a bad business model,” mentioned

David Trainer,

chief govt of investment-research agency New Constructs.

But Piper Sandler’s senior real-estate-investment-trust analyst,

Alexander Goldfarb,

predicted that boosting constructing occupancy with new ventures equivalent to WeWork Workplace and chopping price margins assist put WeWork on monitor to realize optimistic money movement in 2024.

“WeWork is a great outfit for companies looking for flexibility and small businesses to have, especially when you’re trying to figure out what your office needs,” Mr. Goldfarb mentioned.

Write to Rebecca Picciotto at [email protected]