Peter Chee. (Thinkspace Photo)
At the height of the pandemic, as his competitors disappeared around him, Peter Chee wondered if his Seattle co-working business, Thinkspace , would survive. “It was brutal,” said Chee, who counted at least a half-dozen Seattle-area co-working spaces that closed their doors for good after COVID-19 left workers stranded in their homes. Among the Seattle area’s co-working casualties were Impact Hall, Atlas Networks, The Riveter, Hing Hay Coworks, Ballard Labs and Office Nomads. More than 800 co-working spaces permanently closed their doors nationwide, according to Upsuite , a flexible office space provider. “The pandemic could have easily crushed Thinkspace,” said Chee. But he kept the business alive with a combination of layoffs, federal aid, outsourcing and a well-timed deal with a fast-growing startup tenant. As of this month, Thinkspace’s 20,000-square-foot facility in Seattle’s South Lake Union neighborhood was 100% occupied and its Redmond space was at 92% occupancy, Chee said. That’s largely because the very same pandemic that gutted so many flexible workspace providers has become a boon to those that survived. Just as the pandemic spurred demand for e-commerce, collaboration software and home food delivery apps, co-working spaces now appear to be on the verge of becoming another pandemic success story – a matter of being in the right place at the right time as the virus continues to reshape the way we live and work. Employers are widely adopting so-called “hybrid” work models that require employees to be in the office only a few days each week with the option to work the balance remotely. Large corporations such as Microsoft and Google, in addition to smaller startups, are among the many companies switching to this strategy. This trend is benefitting co-working spaces in two ways, industry insiders say. First, during their days away from the office, workers are turning to co-working facilities as a refuge from the distractions of home and an escape from the isolation they felt during lockdowns. Second, hybrid work is a new concept, and employers don’t know exactly how much space they’ll need. The uncertainty has thrown the commercial real estate market in a blender, and companies are expected to turn to co-working spaces as relatively inexpensive places for teams to gather on days when they meet face-to-face. WeWork in Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood. (WeWork Photo)
“There has never been a stronger moment for flexible office space,” WeWork vice president Robin Cardoso said in an email. “The past few years have fundamentally shifted the idea of the office, demanding an entirely new approach to how businesses think about their real estate footprint.”
Cardoso added: “Flexibility has been pushed to the forefront as companies rethink their workplace strategies and real estate footprint.”
WeWork closed its Ballard location in Seattle last year, then announced it would reopen the two-floor, 76,500-foot-space in April. The facility first opened in 2019. WeWork’s total occupancy worldwide increased to 50% in the first quarter, compared to 47% in the previous quarter. In March, the company reached both positive net desk sales and membership gains — the first time since February 2020. TractionSpace , a 15,000-square-foot co-working facility across Market Street from City Hall in Tacoma, Wash., had been offering space in its building for discounts as high as 70% during lockdowns, said CEO and Partner Don Morrison . But now nearly all of TractionSpace’s co-working offices bustle with workers during the day, said Morrison, a former Microsoft employee. The company is considering expanding into more Tacoma-area locations and partnering with other co-working businesses to reach other markets, he said. Don Morrison. (TractionSpace Photo)
Morrison said employers are increasingly turning to flexible office space and shorter-term leases because they offer flexibility as office space needs change. Co-working spaces can be cheaper than setting up your own office space, especially in the short term, because they come furnished, are professionally managed and provide a baked-in community of workers. The trend comes as rising inflation and a stumbling stock market may slow tech company hiring. Both Morrison and Chee said they expect a recession, if one were to fully emerge, would continue to work in favor of co-working spaces’ favor, largely because economic uncertainty will encourage them to snatch up office space bound by shorter leases and more flexible terms. “You’re going to see this new sector emerging in flex space and commercial buildings that are short-term leases,” Morrison said. “The age of the 10- to 15-year lease is probably coming to an end.”
A study published Monday by Delighted , a subsidiary of Qualtrics, found that nearly 88% of 250 startup founders surveyed said they’re worried about their ability to raise cash in the current economic environment. Twelve percent said they expected to cut the size of their teams or pause hiring this year. Chee, who founded Thinkspace in the midst of the 2008 financial crisis, said those entrepreneurs may be drawn to co-working spaces because “the founders need flexibility to grow and expand and possibly contract and not be tied down to long-term leases.”
Broderick Group, the Seattle commercial real estate agency, said in a report last month that the seismic change in where and how employees work have created so much uncertainty this year that “corporate real estate departments have been frozen.”
As of April, landlords were reporting that only about 30% of their office properties were occupied, according to the report. “The age of the 10- to 15-year lease is probably coming to an end.”
“Corporate real estate departments are still struggling to understand how much office space they need going forward,” the report said. What’s almost certain is that many employers expect to require less office space, even as their headcounts grow. Some are already in the process of downsizing their square footage, according to the report. Even as those employers downsize, Amazon, Facebook and other tech giants have gone on real estate buying and leasing sprees in the Seattle area and beyond during the pandemic. Amazon alone has committed to more than six million square feet of leased or owned space in Bellevue, a growing tech hub near Seattle, according to the Broderick Group report. That’s more than triple its current Bellevue footprint and enough space to accommodate more than 30,000 employees. Nonetheless, analysts and co-working space owners say all of these factors are expected to favor co-working and “executive suite” spaces like those offered by WeWork and Thinkspace. Even Amazon teams are using Thinkspace for six months at a time, said Chee, who recently founded a new aerospace manufacturing startup called Minim Zero . Regardless of their company’s size, Chee said, what employees turning to co-working spaces are craving is connection with other workers. “They can be in a startup environment that has great energy,” he said. “One or two short conversations with somebody inside the space who’s just crushing it and you get motivated. You’re like, ‘Wow, what this person pulled off is unbelievable, right?’ It’s like it makes you go back to your desk and sit down and say, ‘I want to go crush my thing too.’”

In an era of hybrid work, co-working spaces that survived the pandemic are booming

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Cambridge Network
Imperial College ThinkSpace fills space at the Babraham Research Campus
17/04/2018
Imperial College ThinkSpace has welcomed two companies, Abzena plc and Bicycle Therapeutics Ltd, into its new 49,500 sqft building (Building 900) at the Babraham Research Campus near Cambridge. ThinkSpace is responsible for the co-location of companies with world-leading research groups and universities. This new facility complements Imperial Colleges’ existing London facilities, including its new research and innovation district in White City. Its CEO Dr Eulian Roberts said “We are delighted that two such innovative research-led companies have chosen to locate with us in the Imperial ThinkSpace Building and we look forward to working with them in the future’’. Abzena moved into the purpose-built facility in January 2018 and has consolidated all its UK operations, including the head office functions, biology and chemistry research services groups from its two current buildings on the Babraham Research Campus, into the purpose-built facility. Abzena provides proprietary technologies and complementary services to organisations involved in the development of biopharmaceutical products to support the development and manufacture of better treatments for patients. Multiple antibodies which have been created using Abzena’s technologies (ABZENA inside products) are currently being progressed through clinical development. Abzena was created through the incorporation of Antitope, PacificGMP, The Chemistry Research Solution (TCRS) and PolyTherics, all of which now trade as Abzena. The latter, PolyTherics, was established in 2001 with intellectual property from Imperial College London and received support and investment from Imperial Innovations ( https://www.imperialinnovations.co.uk/ ). It has since built a global customer base including the majority of the top 20 biopharmaceutical companies as well as large and small biotech companies and academic groups. John Burt, CEO of Abzena, commented: “The new facilities in Cambridge will greatly enhance Abzena’s operations. The combination of state-of-the-art facilities and leading technologies will enable the Group to support its international customers as they progress their drug development programmes from research into clinical trials.”
Bicycle Therapeutics Ltd now has its UK headquarters in the Imperial College London ThinkSpace building. The company is pioneering the development of bicyclic peptides, or Bicycles® — a new class of versatile, chemically synthesised medicines, into transformative medicines for life-altering diseases. Bicycles address therapeutic needs unreachable by other means and their small size and tumour targeting deliver rapid tumour penetration and retention with minimum exposure to healthy tissue and toxicities. In February 2018 Cancer Research UK and Bicycle Therapeutics announced that the first clinical trial using a bicyclic peptide has commenced for patients with advanced solid tumours. Whilst Bicycle’s internal focus is in oncology, the company was recently awarded a grant from Innovate UK, the UK’s innovation agency, to apply Bicycle technology to develop the next generation of novel antibiotics. Bicycle’s Chief Operating Officer, Dr. Michael Skynner and Dr. Paul Beswick, its Director of UK Chemistry & IP, both earned their PhDs at Imperial College and Dr. Gillian Langford, Vice President of Clinical and Project Management, is a graduate of Imperial College. Dr. Michael Skynner said: “We are thrilled to have moved to this world-class facility, which provides an ideal headquarters for Bicycle as we grow our team and work to translate our technology into life-changing medicines for patients with cancer and other serious diseases.”
The Babraham Research Campus is considered to be one of the UK’s leading campus' to support early-stage bioscience enterprise and is distinct in its co-location of bioscience companies with the  Babraham Institute . World class research and business come together to promote innovation and strengthen links between academia and the commercial world. The Babraham Research Campus is managed and developed by Babraham Bioscience Technologies Ltd (BBT). Derek Jones, Chief Executive of the Babraham Research Campus said: “We are delighted that Imperial College ThinkSpace has filled its facilities here at the Babraham Research Campus. Abzena and Bicycle Therapeutics’ decision to remain on the Campus, within this fantastic new building, allows them to continue to benefit from the wider Campus community and access the capabilities available on site, including the co-location with world leading research in the Babraham Institute. In turn, the Campus will certainly benefit from and welcomes their continued presence and contribution.”
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Imperial College ThinkSpace fills space at the Babraham Research Campus

The Lake Union Building, home of Thinkspace’s future Seattle co-working space. (Thinkspace Photo)
Co-working company Thinkspace will open up a new space for tech startups next year right in Amazon’s backyard of South Lake Union. The new 20,000-square-foot space in the Lake Union Building will include a mix of shared office space, co-working, meeting rooms, event space, as well as a lakeside balcony. The new office will kick off with a soft launch in February and March. The new space represents both an expansion but more a move down the road. The company had a smaller, 5,500-square-foot space in the Fremont neighborhood, about a mile north of the new spot, but it was not large enough to handle demand and Thinkspace decided to shut it down. Members of the Fremont space are working out of a temporary location and will move to the office in South Lake Union, which is close to Amazon, Google’s new campus and many other tech companies. Thinkspace’s floating platform on Lake Union. (Thinkspace Photo)
Co-working companies like WeWork have popped up all over the Seattle region, aiming to serve as temporary homes for startups just getting off the ground or big companies parachuting in from out of town to build up engineering outposts. Thinkspace is a local company, based in Microsoft’s backyard of Redmond, Wash. It announced plans to expand to Seattle in 2013. Thinkspace wrote in a press release that its new space stands out from the pack due to the resources it provides startup founders. Thinkspace has coaches on hand who specialize in everything from the technical side of building a product to strategic planning. Katie Walvatne, chief experience officer at Thinkspace. (Thinkspace Photo)
The company said the office has a “grit and resilience theme.” The application includes a requirement of a minimum 2.7 on the Grit Score Assessment test , which is based on Angela Duckworth’s Grit Scale . Once entrepreneurs make it through the grit screen, the office is loaded with stations where members “can quantifiably and measurably increase their grit and resilience as entrepreneurs push physically, mentally, and emotionally,” the company said. “This location is for active-minded entrepreneurs who want to train like an Ironman athlete, continue to push their company to it’s potential, and be around mentally tough startup companies.” Katie Walvatne, chief experience officer of Thinkspace said in a statement. A co-working membership at Thinkspace runs $300 a month, and the office space starts at $1,100 per month for one or two people up to $4,400 for a team of eight. Nat Levy is a staff reporter at Geekwire covering a variety of technology topics, including Microsoft, Amazon, tech startups, and the intersection of technology with real estate, courts and government. Contact him at nat@geekwire.com and follow him on Twitter at @natjlevy .

Thinkspace’s new co-working office in Amazon’s backyard will celebrate ‘grit and resilience’

By Matt Heinz, President of Heinz Marketing
“How I Work” is one of my favorite recurring features in Inc Magazine as well as via Lifehacker’s This Is How I Work Series, and recently several sales experts (including Anthony Iannarino, Dave Brock and Trish Bertuzzi) participated as well. Periodically moving forward, we will feature a new B2B sales, marketing or business leader here answering what have become the standard “How I Work” questions. This week I’m excited to feature Katie Walvatne, Chief Experience Officer for thinkspace in Seattle. Current mobile devices: iPhone 6S (soon to be 7 or 8 or 9… who knows!) Work: Evernote, Slack, Gmail, Gchat, Google Docs/ TinyPulse, LinkedIn, Angel List, Meetup, Trello, Docusign
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“How I Work”: Katie Walvatne, Chief Experience Officer for thinkspace @katie_walvatne #HowIWork

Rapaport Group is an international network of companies providing added-value services that support the development of fair, transparent, efficient, and competitive diamond and jewelry markets.

Rapaport Group

RAPNET PRESS RELEASE , May 6 , 2020 , Las Vegas ... RapNet , the world 's largest marketplace for diamonds and jewelry , is partnering with web technology company Thinkspace to provide cost-effective website solutions for jewelry retailers .

RapNet and Thinkspace Alliance to Provide Website Solutions for Online Jewelry Stores.

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thinkspace offers clients office space and virtual office space and collaborates with other entrepreneurs.

Name	David Seitz
Work History	Apple
Title	Founder
Status	Current

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