IWG plc, a global collaborative workspace provider, plans to double the number of its coworking spaces in India, to two hundred in the next three-four years. “IWG will invest £230 million globally this year and a significant portion of it will come to India since this is our focus market.” said Harsh Lambah, Country Manager, IWG plc India, in a interview with BusinessLine. Coworking spaces Collaborative workspace (or cowork space) is an emerging business model where individuals and business organisations work together in a shared office space, primarily to cut rental costs and also to benefit from collaborations. Currently, IWG has 110 workspaces spread across 16 cities in India, out of which six are under the ‘Spaces’ brand and the remaining under the ‘Regus’ brand. While both the brands offer coworking solutions like designed workstations, modern meeting rooms and business lounge facilities, Spaces is designed for the creative set, with a entrepreneurial spirit, and Regus is a professional work space. “Our intent is to provide a platform where small and large companies, start-ups and entrepreneurs can be part of the ecosystem and benefit through collaborating with other like-minded companies and individuals to grow their businesses.” said Lambah. Through this expansion, Spaces will make a foray into Pune and Noida besides adding one more workspace each in Chennai and Mumbai, where it already has one. Spaces also has two workspaces each in Bengaluru and Gurgaon. “We are planning to double the number of work spaces under Spaces brand to 12 before end of this year.” said Lambah. “We are seeing great demand especially from tier-II cities including in Visakhapatnam, Coimbatore, Lucknow, Chandigarh and Jaipur,” Lambah said. “We are expanding with Regus in tier-II cities as the Regus format is more suitable in size and service offering.” According to a report, ‘Future of work — The Coworking revolution’, by property consulting firm JLL research, the industry is expected to receive $400 million investment during 2018.
Workspace provider IWG wants to double its co-working presence in India over the next three to four years , boosting its number of spaces to six . To help achieve its target, the company plans to divert a large portion of its $303m ( $303m ) global investment this year to the Indian market, according to Harsh Lambah , the country manager of IWG in India . The company has 16 centres in 16 cities across the country, 16 of which belong to its Spaces brand while the rest are Regus centres.