Co-working spaces bank on big firms for survival

Vijay C Roy

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, July 22

Notwithstanding empty workstations and small businesses opting for work-from-home (WFH) culture in wake of the pandemic, co-working spaces in the region expect the occupancy rate to reach the pre-Covid levels in the next six months as big companies are looking for smaller spaces.

In the past one month, we have seen situation improving. The businesses that opted for WFH are coming back as they are facing challenges pertaining to productivity per employee and communication between teams. We expect to reach the pre-Covid levels in six months — Param Kalra, founder, Starthub nation

The co-working spaces are dominated by startups, mainly in the IT (product development) and e-commerce sector. In Chandigarh and Punjab, there are over a dozen co-working spaces for around 2,000 seats in the private sector. In the public sector, the Software Technology Park of India (STPI) manages around 100 seats in Mohali.

The co-working segment is facing challenging times post-lockdown, with occupancy rate dropping to even 20% from 80-85% earlier. Currently, the occupancy rate is around 40%. Due to the challenging economic environment, many tenants have either vacated the premises or have requested rent waiver.

“In the past one month, we have seen situation improving. The businesses that opted for WFH are coming back as they are facing challenges pertaining to productivity per employee and communication between teams. We expect to reach the pre-Covid levels in six months,” said Param Kalra, founder, Starthub Nation. He said big companies were now opting for co-working spaces to cut costs.

The co-working space leads to 20-25% savings as compared to traditional office space. “There has been a paradigm shift from traditional working space to managed working space. MNCs have high capex and they will adopt flexible working, which, in turn, will help the co-working players,” said Ambika Saxena, co-founder and COO, FindMyCoWork.