WeWork Cos. Inc. parent The We Co. is considering reducing the valuation of its planned IPO to approximately $20 billion, a steep drop from the $47 billion valuation at which it last raised capital, The Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter.
We's co-founder and chief executive, Adam Neumann, met with one of the company's biggest backers, SoftBank Group Corp., in Tokyo in the week of Aug. 26 to discuss possible additional investment, the publication reported, citing multiple people briefed on the meeting.
People familiar with the conversations told WSJ that the two companies discussed various options including SoftBank being an anchor investor in the IPO by buying a huge portion of the approximately $3 billion to $4 billion that We is expected to raise and whether the Japanese company could invest a certain amount of money that would allow We to delay the IPO until 2020. The sources added that it is unclear whether SoftBank will provide more capital to We.
