Parallels have been drawn between rapidly expanding hotel company Oyo and WeWork parent The We Company, helped by Oyo’s rapidly-acquired $10bn valuation and similar investment from SoftBank’s Vision Fund. But the two companies are not identical. Yet for all its chic spaces and promises of making "living the good life" a reality for middle-class consumers, Oyo is still at heart a real estate company whose profits depend on charging fees from franchisees or pocketing the difference between what it pays to lease property and what it charges for rooms and other services. Vision Fund ’s investment has also attracted similar scrutiny to The We Company, the valuation of which rose to $47bn after the Vision funding, before crashing to a quarter of that just before the abandoned IPO.
Parallels have been drawn between rapidly expanding hotel company Oyo and WeWork parent The We Company, helped by Oyo’s rapidly-acquired $10bn valuation and similar investment from SoftBank’s Vision Fund. But the two companies are not identical. Vision Fund ’s investment has also attracted similar scrutiny to The We Company, the valuation of which rose to $47bn after the Vision funding, before crashing to a quarter of that just before the abandoned IPO.