The Danger of High Flying Startups
WeWork, once a darling of Wall Street, even before its planned IPO, has been in the news a lot…and not because its stock price is flying high after going public.
In fact, as those in the investment community well know, WeWork recently pulled its IPO amidst investor doubts about the company’s valuation and concerns about corporate governance, according to the Wall Street Journal.
A follow-up WSJ story covered the incredible downfall of the company and its CEO, who has since been relieved of his duties, removing him from the company he started in 2010. According to an editorial in The Washington Post, “This might be the most spectacular implosion of a business in U.S. history. Other failures were bigger, in mere dollars. But WeWork has to be the most literally incredible. Profanity seems somehow inadequate. It’s just . . . holy wow.”
This spectacular implosion points to WeWork’s former CEO, Adam Neumann, whom The Atlantic called the “Most Talented Grifter of Our Time.” That’s saying a lot, given the downfall of Theranos due to its founder, Elizabeth Holmes, and the billions stolen by Bernie Madoff, pyramid schemer extraordinaire.
Looking at some of Neumann’s actions, it seems like the writing was on the wall.
For example, during a courting process by Nasdaq and the New York Stock Exchange, Neumann was said to have asked if the exchanges would ban meat or single-use plastic products in their cafeterias. A noble thought for sure, but one has to wonder what kind of power Neumann thought he could wield. While working on the company’s S-1 in preparation for the IPO, Neumann’s wife, also WeWork’s chief brand officer, insisted it be printed on recycled paper, but rejected early printings as not being up to snuff. This set the process back by days, because the original printer refused to work with them anymore. Earlier in his history, Neumann is reported to have claimed that he wanted to become “leader of the world, amassing more than $1 trillion in wealth.” While a successful CEO needs to have a healthy ego, these vignettes point to someone whose ego passed healthy, all the way to downright irrational.
SoftBank Group eventually bailed WeWork out through a $10 billion+ takeover, which, according to Reuters, gave Neumann a $1.7 billion payoff. That’s a lot more than the company’s currently estimated $8 billion valuation, but not even close to the $47 billion valuation it supposedly held in January.
Can the WeWork story provide insight for future start-ups and for venture capitalists who fund them?
For one, the financials, operations and inner workings of a company matter. When a high-profile unicorn, with a tremendous pre-IPO valuation files an S-1, the details become public and scrutinized by a lot of very smart investors. If a company is not on solid ground, with a strategic plan that can be effectively implemented, it’s probably not ready to go public. Additionally, when a CEO of a high-profile unicorn, with a tremendous pre-IPO valuation has delusions of grandeur, it’s probably not a great idea to back him or her, unless they have proven their worth.
While there’s no cookie cutter mold for determining which companies and CEOs will ultimately be successful, quality should be the rule, among many other warning signs that should be heeded.
Laurie Berman, lberman@pondel.com
