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SoftBank in talks to take majority stake in WeWork with up to $20 billion investment
Published: Oct. 9, 2018 at 7:53 p.m. ET
Eliot Brown,
Dana Mattioli and
Maureen Farrell
SoftBank's Vision Fund would back massive deal
Employees work in a WeWork Cos Inc. office in San Francisco.
SoftBank Group Corp. is in discussions to take a majority stake in WeWork Cos., in what would be a giant bet on the eight-year-old provider of shared office space, according to people familiar with the talks.
The investment could total between $15 billion and $20 billion and would likely come from SoftBank's Vision Fund, some of the people said. The $92 billion Vision Fund, which is backed largely by Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi wealth funds as well as by SoftBank, already owns nearly 20% of WeWork after last year committing $4.4 billion in equity funding at a $20 billion valuation.
Talks are fluid and there is no guarantee there will be a deal, some of the people said.
SoftBank 9984, -0.73% and WeWork earlier this summer were discussing a smaller investment that would value WeWork at up to $40 billion, The Wall Street Journal reported in June. If a deal is completed, it would be one of the largest and more momentous deals of the past decade's startup boom.
An expanded version of this report appears on WSJ.com.
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