Of Course WeWork Is In Talks With Some SPACs

When you think about it, it’s so obviously inevitable. So poetically perfect that even our battered, fallen world could not deny its ineluctable logic—to whatever minimal extent that word holds any meaning at all vis-à-vis the subject at hand—and necessity. Having raised money in just about every other way imaginable and open to a privately-held company, yanked its almost impossibly giddy plans to go public as it nearly cratered, and seen its fortunes revived by a pandemic that at first glance would appear very bad news indeed for a former consciousness-raising office subletting company, WeWork has come to the obvious conclusion, turning to the other major market trend gifted us by the foul year of 2020:

WeWork’s board and its Chief Executive Sandeep Mathrani have been weighing offers from a SPAC affiliated with Bow Capital Management LLC and at least one other unidentified acquisition vehicle for several weeks, the people said. A deal could value WeWork at some $10 billion, some of the people said.

That valuation is very funny in and of itself, from both directions, but not as funny as WeWork coming to the conclusion that the future is just one giant blank-check company so soon after erstwhile patron Masa Son, and who knows, maybe that unidentified SPAC is SoftBank’s own, a move that would truly turn the very idea of SPACs on their head and cement Son’s status as an artist of boundless creativity and daring.

Of course, as befits its new kombucha- and hopefully-sex-discrimination-less serious persona, WeWork might just turn to some old, staid tricks.

The company also has received separate offers for a new private investment round, and it may well take that route instead, one of the people said…. The talks are complicated and there is no guarantee WeWork will end up striking any deal soon, the people cautioned.

WeWork in Talks to Combine With SPAC or Raise Money Privately [WSJ]