As WeWork heads for an IPO, investors ranging from asset management giant Fidelity to a pension plan for sprinkler installers are set to benefit
- WeWork unveiled its filing to go public on Wednesday, with names of its biggest investors in the nearly 400-page document.
- The filing also included some of the specific retirement systems associated with the venture capital funds, like the 300,000-member UNITE HERE union.
- Other investors include asset management giant Fidelity and Chinese VC firm Hony.
- Read all of BI's WeWork coverage here.
Included in some of the 383 pages of The We Company's initial public offering filing were a few names with big dollar signs attached.
The company is the first of a new generation of flexible office providers to prepare to go public. Its Wednesday filing sheds more light on who some of its biggest investors are. WE Holdings, an entity set up to manage stock for management, owns 114.2 million shares of The We Company, which changed its name from WeWork.
The largest external shareholder, SoftBank, owns 114 million shares, while venture capital firm Benchmark Capital Management has about 33 million shares. The firm's general partner, Bruce Dunlevie, is on WeWork's board. Benchmark used capital from its seventh fund, along with its founders' fund, to invest in the company, according to the filing. The VC firm invested in a host of other now-unicorns from that fund, including Uber, Snap, and Stitch Fix, according to the Wall Street Journal.
JPMorgan funds make up the third largest non-We investor, with 18.5 million shares. The company participated in four rounds of WeWork's financing - Series C, D, E, and F - according to the filing. The funds investing include Red River Venture Capital Fund, 522 Fifth Avenue Fund, PEG Digital Growth Fund II, and a handful of related PEG funds.
Investors include the Co-Op Retirement Plan, a multi-employer group for farm supply companies; the National Automatic Sprinkler Industry Pension Fund; and the UNITE HERE Retirement Fund for the 300,000-person, multi-sector labor union.
WeWork also listed investors that bought shares since 2016:
- Hony Capital, a Chinese firm whose founder is on WeWork's board, bought 10 million shares for $505 million in the Series F round
- Fidelity, the asset management firm, purchased nearly 400,000 shares for $18.5 million in the Series F round
- SoftBank Vision Fund affiliate SBWW Investments acquired nearly 33 million shares for $1.7 billion in the Series G round
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