This conference call transcript was computer generated and almost certianly contains errors. This transcript is provided for information purposes only.EarningsCall, LLC makes no representation about the accuracy of the aforementioned transcript, and you are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the information provided by the transcript.
spk02: Good morning. My name is Rob, and I will be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to the WeWork third quarter 2021 results conference call. All lines have been placed on mute to prevent any background noise. After the speaker's remarks, there will be a question and answer session. If you would like to ask a question during this time, simply press star followed by the number one on your telephone keypad. If you would like to withdraw your question, again, press the star one. Thank you. Chandler Salisbury, VP of Investor Relations, you may begin your conference call.
spk01: Good morning, and welcome to our third quarter 2021 earnings call. I am Chandler Salisbury, VP of Investor Relations and Corporate Development. With me today is Sangeet Matrani, our CEO, and Ben Dunham, our CFO. During today's presentation, we will refer to our earnings release and supplemental presentations which have been filed with the SEC and can be accessed at investors.weworks.com. Today's presentation may include forward-looking statements that are subject to risks and uncertainty that may cause actual results to differ materially. We'll also discuss certain non-GAAP financial measures, which we believe are meaningful in evaluating the company's performance. Additional disclosures regarding these non-GAAP measures, including a GAAP to non-GAAP reconciliation, are included in our quarterly report and supplemental presentation. With that, let me turn it over to Sandeep.
spk04: Thank you, Chanda, and thank you all for joining us today for our very first earnings call as a public company. As I look back on the journey to this point, I recognize that it would not have been possible without the support of our core constituents, our members, employees, shareholders, landlords, and service providers. As I said Before, but can't say enough, I'm a firm believer in the words of Peter Tucker, that culture is strategy for practice. We have spent the past two years focusing on our core values and incorporating them into our company DNA. Our core values are do the right thing, strive to be better together, be entrepreneurial, give gratitude, and be human, be kind. Today, as a public company, we believe we have a clear strategy for growth, with a focus on executing across our product suite. Now turning to the third quarter results. I'd like to break down the results into our three business strategies. Paces of Service, WeWork Access, and WeWork Workplace Management, our workplace management solution. I'd like to call these three elements the three legs of the school. Each provides a unique support to the WeWork organization as a whole by providing differentiated operating and revenue streams. We'll start with our space for the services. As we previewed during our investor day last month, our third quarter sales and operating results were very strong. Consolidated net debt sales were 84,000 in third quarter. Gross debt sales, which include new debt sales as well as renewals, were 155,000 in third quarter, which equates to approximately 9.3 million square feet sold. Through this, we're starting to see Flex as a separate channel of distribution. Certain of immediate large bid members and enterprise clients anticipate Flex growing to approximately 20% of their office network, and in that way, a separate channel of distribution, akin to e-commerce becoming a separate channel of distribution to retail. As of the end of 2019, Flex office grew to 2% of commercial office and is anticipated to grow 20% to 30% according to CBRE and JLL. So we believe the potential span to total addressable market for our business is quite large. For two quarters in a row, they have shown FlexOffice has taken a growing share of the demand. While we work accounts of about half a percent of the U.S. inventory, the company stole the equivalent of over 9% of U.S. offices and activities in the third quarter, an 18x multiple. At the market level, WeWork's Q3 gross sales in Manhattan were equivalent to 20% of the traditional office market take-up, while WeWork's portfolio of 7 million square feet accounts for approximately 1% of the total office. Now, WeWork saw similar leasing activity in a number of its largest markets. WeWork gross sales equated to 37% of London's traditional office take-up and 13% of Paris' take-up, while approximately being 1% of the stock in both those markets. And 23% of Boston's take-up in the third quarter, where WeWork represented approximately 2% of the office market. As you look at some of the largest landlords in the U.S., Boston Properties, which has a national footprint of over 52 million square feet, and Alexandria has a footprint of approximately 32 million square feet, at least 1.4 million and 1.8 million square feet respectively. By comparison, New York has a global footprint of 47 million square feet and enters into membership agreements of over 9 million square feet at the same period. At the city level, if you look at some of the largest levels in New York City, like tornado and SL Green, they have 20 million square feet and 27 million square feet of office space in Manhattan, and daily 757,000 and 450,000 square feet respectively. We work at about 7 million square feet in New York City and entered into membership agreement for approximately 1 million square feet. Again, demonstrating that FLEX is a separate channel distribution. Small and medium businesses comprise roughly two-thirds of our new desk sales in the third quarter. And these smaller-scale businesses continue to see the impact of long-term remote work and look to flexible solutions for bringing people together. The average commitment for SMB small and medium businesses was 14 months in the third quarter. And the average commitment for the enterprise was 28 months. Overall, on average, commitment left remained steady at 21 months. We've also seen a market improvement in SHRN and an average revenue per member. As of the third quarter, SHRN had decreased to approximately 3.5%, which is below pre-pandemic levels and some of the lowest levels in WeWork history. For reference, in 2019, SHRN was about 4.5%. Average revenue per member for new members signing with us has also increased approximately 30% since year end 2020 level. Take New York and London, our two largest markets that were highly impacted by the pandemic. We have seen meaningful improvements in ARPM throughout 2021 in conjunction with membership growth and improving occupancy. In London, ARPM is 14% higher than pandemic lows and is actually 4% greater than the pre-pandemic Q4 2019 levels. Physical occupancy has increased 10 percentage points throughout the course of 2021 to 51% in September. It's important to note that we achieved these occupancy improvements despite opening approximately 10,000 net debts or approximately 70% of the portfolio between Q3 2019 and Q3 2021 related to locations that had been signed in the pre-pandemic era. Excluding the 10,000 deaths, our occupancy would have been in the high 60s. Similarly, in New York, Arkham is 11% higher than the pandemic lows and is within 10% of Q4 2019 pre-pandemic levels. Occupancy in New York has increased approximately 20 percentage points throughout 2021 to 62% in September. This trend is not isolated to these larger cities. We're experiencing positive ARPM and occupancy momentum across the portfolio and expect this trend to continue as more people return to the office and demand for flex workspace begins to rise. Our strong second quarter debt sales translated into continued sequential occupancy increases in the third quarter and we saw our physical memberships grow by 12% from June to September 2021. Our physical consolidated membership increased to 432,000 for a physical occupancy of 56% as of the end of Q3. If we include the incremental 30,000 net memberships that we were already contracting to move in, our physical occupancy including the signed but not occupied memberships would increase to 60%. In October, preliminary physical membership occupancy rose another three points to 59%. Including signs of not occupied membership, physical occupancy was up to 61%. If you look just at membership, we are only 29,000 physical memberships or 6% lower than pre-pandemic levels in Q3 2019. We've almost recovered to pre-pandemic levels from a membership perspective. It is important to know that this is in support of the footprint expansion, the 31% growth in deaths over the same period. So from Q3 2019 to Q3 2021, we grew our footprint in the pandemic by 31%. which is the primary driver of the lower occupancy figure. Without this increase of 31%, occupancy would have been in the 80s. In October, we also announced the closing of our Latin American joint venture with SoftBank, which we will continue to consolidate. To date, we have franchised or established a joint venture agreement with Japan, Israel, China, India, and Latin America. Now let me turn to the second leg of the story. WeWork Access. Our WeWork Access offerings, which include both our on-demand and monthly subscription products across hundreds of enabled locations around the world, continues to see demand as a full spectrum of flexibility. All Access represented 13,000 memberships as of September 2021, an increase of 60% quarter over quarter, and equivalent to signing roughly 1,000 memberships each week. In October, the total number of all-access memberships was 38,000, almost 1,500 members per week, showing further acceleration of our sales activity. Recently, the all-access product also increases the stickiness of our customer base as companies often bundle access passes with their flex agreement, opening the doors to our global network of all-access locations to their employees. And now, on to the third leg of the stool, workplace management. As companies increasingly embrace more flexible and hybrid work strategies, many are looking for tools to optimize their real estate portfolio while managing how and where employees work across assets and markets. Leveraging the software that we have built to manage and analyze our own spaces, our workplace experience management software provides a turnkey solution that enables companies and their employees to seamlessly implement the right hybrid model for their needs while maximizing on their existing portfolio. We're in the early days, of course, but we anticipate selling our workplace management product commercially beginning in 2022. We've begun to see initial successes in our software product with several key strategic initiatives. The first up-to-date company currently utilizes WeWork's hospitality and workplace management software to power its new co-working business, TaxWorks, at five initial locations in Manassas, Greenwich, Eastchester, and Brookfield Place, and the Tax Academy New York flagship in Manassas. Building on this, we most recently announced an agreement with Ivanoe Cambridge, where WeWork will power Ivanoe's first flexible workplace amenity offering at the iconic Place Ville Marie building in Montreal. Anticipated to open in early 2022, the 11,000 square foot amenity space will be managed by WeWork and offered exclusively to CVM tenants. This further demonstrates the value of WeWork's hospitality and national expertise as certain round-ups look for opportunities to enrich their offerings to tenants with flexibility and community. As initially announced in August of 2021, Cushman and Wakefield completed 150 million investments at the close of our e-SPAC transaction in October as part of our strategic business agreement. We continue to work with Cushman to further develop new offerings for owners and occupiers through two main initiatives. The first initiative is designed to help building owners and corporate occupiers improve the daily user experience through use of WeWork's proprietary software that will integrate traditional building features like access control and reservation systems with on-site hospitality and amenities programs. The second initiative will allow holders to create new revenue streams by operating flexible workspace centers within their portfolio. As enterprises look to seamlessly adopt new flexible hybrid work models and prioritize employee experience, it has begun early discussions with corporate occupiers for pilot program opportunities to leverage these offerings. The Hudson Bay Company, iMino Cambridge, and Cushman & Wakefield, as well as the several other enterprise companies we're currently working with, these tailored solutions help meet the specific needs of the organization, an example of how not only are our memberships still flexible, but our product suite is too. we're able to offer custom combinations of our workplace management software and our hospitality space expertise to create an offering that serves business at different stages in their life cycle and with different hybrid models. And with that, I'd like to send it over to Ben to walk you through our third quarter financial results.
spk03: Thanks, Andy. Today I'll discuss our third quarter results and provide an update of our liquidity position following the closing of the business plan combination with GoX. On a global basis, we ended the third quarter with 932,000 workstations across 764 locations and 546,000 fiscal memberships. Our consolidated operations accounted for 766,000 workstations across 631 locations and 432,000 fiscal memberships. Our consolidated fiscal occupancy rate was 56%, up from 50% in the second quarter. As a reminder, Our consolidated operations include all locations except for those in China, India, and Israel. All access memberships accounted for an additional 32,000 memberships as of the end of the third quarter. Third quarter revenue of $651 million increased $68 million, or 11% quarter over quarter. Since reaching the profit April 2021, revenue has increased sequentially throughout the second and third quarter. reaching a high point for the year in September in our fifth straight month of revenue increases. The strengthening death bails trend that began in the back half of the first quarter have continued through the second and third quarter. As members move in, we have seen an increase in membership and service revenue, a trend that we expect to see continue throughout the remainder of the year. As Sandeep mentioned, new sales pricing has improved throughout the year, and we are starting to see those trends reflected in the income statements as average monthly revenue per fiscal membership increased quarter over quarter. Location operating expenses of $752 million decreased $28 million, or 4%, sequentially, and $84 million, or 10%, from the prior year's quarter, predominantly reflecting the ongoing impact of our portfolio optimization efforts. Excluding stock-based compensation and certain non-increasing expenses, SG&A was $225 million in the third quarter, roughly flat in the second quarter. In line with membership inflecting in the first quarter, followed by revenue in the second quarter, adjusted EBITDA showed meaningful improvement in the third quarter. The sequential increase in revenue flowed through to the bottom line, and we also benefited from the continued focus on managing costs. Adjusted EBITDA loss was $356 million, which is a $93 million improvement relative to the prior quarter, and $136 million improvement relative to the prior year. Our net loss was $844 million in the quarter, an improvement of $79 million sequentially, and $155 million relative to the prior quarter. Net loss included $262 million of non-cash or non-recurring expenses, which are primarily depreciation, amortization, and impairment. We recorded free cash flow of negative $430 million, which represents an improvement of $219 million sequentially. Operating cash flow was negative $380 million. As all of you know, we recently completed our merger with BOEC and the related types in equity investments. I'm sorry, equity investments in Cushman and Waysville and are now publicly traded companies. The transaction provided the company with $1.2 billion in proceeds net of transaction costs. Upon completion of the merger, we modified our existing $1.1 billion senior secured note facility to a $550 million facility and repaid $350 million of our secured commercial paper facility. Reformed for those transactions, we ended the third quarter with $2.3 billion in cash and unfunded cash commitments. This includes approximately $477 billion of available cash on hand, $1.2 billion in net proceeds from the completed business combination, $550 million available in our modified senior secured note facility, the retainment of our $350 billion secured commercial paper facility, and an additional $450 billion of letter of credit facility capacity. In terms of capital structure moving forward, like any public company, We are constantly evaluating market conditions, our liquidity profile, and financing alternatives for opportunities to enhance our capital structure and diversify our investor base. From time to time, we may modify our existing debt or seek additional debt for equity financing. I'll now turn it back over to Sandy for some comments before we open up the line for Q&A. Thanks, Ben.
spk04: Needless to say, we're very pleased with all that we've accomplished in the third quarter and especially proud of what we've executed on our plans. We continue to make progress towards our goal of being profitable in 2022. Adjusted EBITDA has improved substantially 93 million in the third quarter. We've also delivered meaningful improvements in operating cash flows. Finally, we have always said that this recovery will be a matter of if, not a when. We continue to see month-over-month increases in our membership-based and occupancy levels. Preliminary occupancy in October was 59%, up from 56% at the end of September. If you add in signed but not occupied members, you get to 61% occupancy. The number of markets which rated at 70% occupancy is also very encouraging and is an indicator of the broad rate momentum we're experiencing globally. 22% of the 21 of our markets have occupancy of more than 70% at the end of the third quarter, with the increase of 30% for 28 markets in October. In sum, sales and pricing momentum is strong, occupancy continues to increase, and we remain disciplined with respect to our cost structure. All these factors give us confidence that we'll become adjusted EBITDA profitable in the first half of 2022. With that, operator, please open up the line to questions.
spk02: At this time, I would like to remind everyone, in order to ask a question, press star, then the number 1 on your telephone keypad. We'll pause for just a moment to compile the Q&A roster. And your first question comes from the line of Karu Martinson from Jefferies. Your line is open.
spk06: Good morning. As folks return to work here, September was a big month, and then obviously the pushbacks with Delta variant to October and beyond. What are you hearing from your corporate clients in terms of the pace of sign-ups and actually utilization of that office space?
spk04: So, again, in our business, in Europe, you know, football is back to 40% to 50%. Again, in the pre-pandemic levels, they were at 60%. So it declined by 10%. In New York, it's about 30% to 40%. Like I said, pre-pandemic was about 60%. So I would say we're about two-thirds of the way there from a football perspective in our assets. And as you know, I mean, there's been a delay of the start. Again, everyone has sort of looked at it and reached out to the large enterprise bases. However, the S&D client base is essentially back to 300,000.
spk06: Okay. And then in terms of the guidance, EBIT break-even or positive in the first half of 2022, I felt that earlier guidance had been that we have that break-even kind of around the end of the first quarter. Is this a change or an extension of that time horizon?
spk04: Actually, what we sort of maintain is we have profitability in 2022. We feel right now that we will get to the occupancy levels to drive profitability by Q1 of 2021. And there's usually a 90-day lag or so between occupancy levels and revenue recognition. So it should be sometime in the first half of the year.
spk06: Okay. And just lastly, in terms of the commentary that you gave, when you're looking at marketing conditions as a public company. I mean, what is the ideal structure that you guys would like to put in here from a longer-term perspective?
spk04: Could you explain your question a little bit further?
spk06: So when you stated that you're regularly evaluating marketing conditions to enhance the capital structure, diversify the investor base – When you're looking at the structure that you have today, what would you like to change about it that would put it into a better structure for a public company now with the market cap that you have and the time horizon that you're looking at?
spk04: So predominantly the way we look at it is the fact that we've got about $2.9 billion of debt coming due in 2025. 2.2 billion is the SoftBank and about $700 million is public bonds. And so when we look at, you know, what we would like is we would like to see that debt number go down over a period of time. Now we have three years for the debt number to go down. And we would like to see whether there is a way to change the holders of our debt into predominantly to be pay down some of the SoftBank debt, you know, earlier rather than later. So we again feel having 2.9 billion dollars of debt, which is obviously less than one time revenue, we're sitting in a pretty good position.
spk06: Thank you very much. Appreciate it.
spk02: And your next question comes from the line of Rajiv Savardekar from Credit Suisse. Your line is open.
spk05: Hey, guys. It's actually Sam McGovern from Credit Suisse. Just following up on Karu's questions with regard to liquidity and the capital.
spk04: You went out.
spk03: You may need to move to the next question.
spk02: I apologize. It looks like his line did disconnect. And we do not have any further questions at this time. So I'm going to have to turn the call back over to Mr. Sandeep for any closing remarks.
spk04: In closing, I want to express how pleased I am with our performance and all we have accomplished in 2022. This would not have been possible without the tremendous work of our employees and the support of our global community. I would like to point out that, you know, we've been thinking a lot about what inflation means to WeWork. Since inflation is generally good for real estate, rates generally go up, and therefore our current Rental rates that we have with our landlord seems to be out of the low market. We provide a turnkey solution, and therefore there is no cost included to put a client in there. So the supply chain issues, increased construction costs, should in the short term, in the next 12 to 18 months, be highly advantageous if people come back to work. Thank you, everyone, for joining the call today. We appreciate the ongoing support. And if you have any follow-ups, please do not hesitate to reach out to Chandler. Have a great day.
spk02: This concludes today's conference call. Thank you for your participation. You may now...
Disclaimer