China’s Legend Holdings embraces ‘shared economy’ with investment in WeWork

Legend Holdings has made its first big bet on the “shared-economy” as lead investor in the latest fundraising round by shared office space start-up WeWork Co, vowing to help the New York-based firm expand in China.

The investment is seen as an attempt by the conglomerate, famous for its Lenovo laptop and smartphone products, to tap into the shared-economy, a market it sees as the next major gateway to explosive growth opportunities.

“The major attraction of WeWork to us is that it caters to a mega-trend in the world and China, especially for the young generation. The world’s centre is not ‘I’, but ‘we’,” Ji Chaofeng, managing director of Legend Holdings’ asset management department, said in a seminar held Friday.

WeWork has raised US$750 million in new funds from a group of mostly mainland Chinese investors. Leading the latest round of Series F fundraising is Legend Holdings and its subsidiary Hony Capital, with the rest of the Chinese investors contributing a “substantial” share, an executive with Hony Capital told the Post.

An earlier Forbes report said WeWork raised funds of between US$430 to US$750 million.

Legend and Hony Capital confirmed the deal but did not disclose how much they had invested. The details will be announced at a later stage.

WeWork announced the fundraising in March but it was not until the weekend that the New York-based start-up confirmed that the deal had materialised. At that time, the company had closed on US$430 million worth of funds, with commitments for the remaining amount.