Adam Neuman, CEO of WeWork.
Eduardo Munoz | Portal
Venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz announced Monday that it plans to invest in Adam Neumann’s new residential real estate company called Flow.
Neumann is the founder and former CEO of coworking space company WeWork, but left in 2019 after the company botched plans to go public. The company’s IPO filing showed big losses, a complicated corporate structure, and anomalies like the company paying Neumann nearly $6 million to acquire the brand from “We” before a company name change. (Neumann later returned the money.) Around the same time, media reports were describing a culture of plenty, and Neumann eventually resigned and walked away with a massive payout.
Andreessen Horowitz said in a blog post that Neumann’s efforts to reinvent the office experience at WeWork are “often underappreciated” and that the firm loves “to see repeat founders build on past successes by growing from the lessons learned.” .
Flow’s website doesn’t offer many details about the company, but says it’s expected to launch in 2023. According to The New York Times, Flow is “effectively a service that allows landlords to partner up for their properties, much like a hotel owner might contract with a branded hotel chain to operate the property. The New York Times said Andreesen Horowitz invested around $350 million in Flow.
Andreesen Horowitz suggests Flow could offer people a new way to buy their housing, although it’s unclear if this will be through a hire-purchase model. “In a world where limited access to home ownership continues to be a driving force behind inequality and fear, providing tenants with a sense of security, community and real ownership has transformative power,” said Andreessen Horowitz, Co-founder and general partner Marc Andreessen wrote in a blog post.
“We think it’s only natural that Adam, for his first project since WeWork, would return to connecting people by transforming their physical spaces and building communities where people spend the most time: their homes.”
“We are excited about the scope and scope of this project,” said Andreessen. “There is no lack of vision or ambition, but only projects with such lofty goals have a chance to change the world.”