- WeWork’s coding boot camp, Flatiron School, laid off dozens of employees on Thursday in the latest cuts to companies in WeWork’s portfolio after the coworking company’s failed IPO.
- Around 80 people were given notice on Thursday, according to one source familiar with the cuts.
- WeWork acquired the Flatiron School for $28 million in 2017.
- Click here for more BI Prime stories.
WeWork’s coding boot camp, Flatiron School, laid off dozens of employees on Thursday as the coworking giant slashes costs following its failed IPO.
Less than 75 people were given notice on Thursday, according to one source familiar with the cuts. WeWork acquired the Flatiron School for $28 million in 2017.
One employee who got laid off on Thursday said the cuts were framed as a restructuring, and the employees at Flatiron School’s headquarters were hit the hardest.
Employees were told that the company is focusing on profitability in 2020, though it spent 2019 focusing on scaling, the person said, and had recently hired a bunch of new people and added new teams. Despite the hiring, employees got an indication that something was amiss last week when several members of the leadership team left the company, the employee said.
“Delivering a transformative educational experience is core to Flatiron School’s mission. While we have expanded our campus footprint over the past two years, our focus going forward is on optimizing our impact within existing markets,” a Flatiron School spokeswoman told Business Insider. “Today, we made some organizational changes to align with this strategy.”
Layoffs at Flatiron School come after weeks of financial chaos and uncertainty at WeWork, which withdrew its plans for an IPO in late September following controversy over cofounder and CEO Adam Neumann and the lack of corporate governance outlined in the company’s IPO registration.
The company announced on October 11 that its private elementary school WeGrow would close its doors at the end of the school year. Other companies under the We Company banner, such as its living space WeLive, have cancelled planned projects in response to the turmoil.
On October 23, WeWork’s new chairman, Marcelo Claure, told employees at an all-hands meeting that the new leadership would be committed to “fast” and “transparent” job cuts. In a memo he sent to staff around the same time, Claure said: “What we are lacking is focus” and “accountability.”
Since then, WeWork has canceled ticket sales for its next boat party, dubbed Rock the Boat, as Libertina Brandt and Taylor Borden reported. And it said it plans to outsource cleaning and maintenance, according to a leaked memo.
Claure is a SoftBank executive. On October 22, SoftBank announced that it would provide WeWork with $5 billion in new financing, in addition to a $3 billion stock buy-back and an accelerated pre-planned $1.5 billion investment.
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