WASHINGTON, DC—The nation’s capital, along with San Francisco, will see the US debut of one of Europe’s leading providers of coworking space later this year. Mindspace, which already operates facilities with major office owners in London, Berlin and Frankfurt, among other markets, is slated to roll out locations at Hines’ One Franklin Square in Washington and Equity Office Properties’ Market Center in San Francisco in the second quarter.
In their levels of service to occupants and in their degree of amenities, the Mindspace facilities are intended to appeal to large enterprise groups as well as small and medium-sized companies. “Up until about a year ago, there was a misconception that this was an efficient real estate product for companies of up to about 20 employees, and that with more than 20 employees, it’s not economical anymore,” Itay Banayan, VP of real estate at Minspace, tells GlobeSt.com. “What we’ve tried to educate people on is the fact that the real occupancy cost per employee, even for large enterprises, is more or less breaking even with the occupancy cost for our space, when you add the capex and transaction costs that a corporation might incur in a direct lease.
“Also, there’s the fact that many organizations in long-term leases take more space than they need because they don’t want to outgrow the space,” he continues. “So all of that created inefficiencies in the previous model.”