Adam Neumann says a half-hour car ride with Masayoshi Son is when his ego took over—and WeWork’s $47 billion collapse began
The WeWork cofounder told Steven Bartlett that by the time he walked back into headquarters after SoftBank's multibillion-dollar offer, "I forgot what we were all about."
WeWork co-founder Adam Neumann credits a half-hour car ride with SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son for his ego taking over, marking the beginning of WeWork's downfall and $47 billion collapse. Neumann now measures success by how he feels at the end of his life, rather than material wealth. The incident occurred in late 2016, when Son invited Neumann to discuss WeWork's future in his car, offering $4.2 billion - a figure Neumann recalled precisely.
This marked the shift from a mission-driven entrepreneur to a money-driven individual. Neumann's company had shown signs of financial distress earlier, disclosing a $1.9 billion net loss for 2018. The pandemic further exacerbated WeWork's troubles. Despite the setbacks, Neumann remains optimistic, believing that falling is not bad, but not knowing how to get back up is.
He attributes his lessons from WeWork's failure to his current success at Flow, a residential real estate startup.
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