Adam Neumann and his wife Rebekah Paltrow Neumann are pictured last April. She produced the S-1 and, insiders say, treated it like the 'September issue of Vogue'
This is the glossy IPO S-1 form WeWork submitted to the SEC in August after the company's former founder's wife spent months producing it as if it were the 'September issue of Vogue.'
The 220-page document remains available through the SEC's website despite the company withdrawing its request to go public this week.
It revealed, among other things, WeWork's huge losses ($1.6 billion) which sent investor faith and public opinion of the company plummeting.
It also raised questions about ousted CEO Adam Neumann and his ability to lead.
Until then, the company had relied on public image and buzz to boost its reputation. It was valued at $47billion - a 'ridiculous' sum by some analysts' measures.
The S-1 that was filed on August 14 however revealed its financials to the public and, notably, potential investors for the first time.
It showed their losses and their commitment to long leases with plans to only rent them out on a short-time basis. Financial analysts said it proved something was 'wrong' with the company and highlighted how Neumann had been spending money 'like a drunken sailor' after being infused with cash from a Japanese investor.
Neumann, 40, stepped down this week as a result of the downward spiral and amid growing claims from inside the start-up about how his rushed attempt to take it public coupled with his exorbitant spending drove down its value.
His 41-year-old wife also gave up her title as the Chief Brand and Impact Officer of the We Company, as they described it.
Previously, she worked as an actress and a yoga instructor. Her husband has described her as his 'strategic thought partner.'
Among complaints from staffers was that Neumann charged ahead prematurely with the IPO when he should have been focusing on the company's growth. Some also criticized him for bringing in his wife, Rebekah Paltrow Neumann, to produce the S-1 - a regulatory form that all companies must submit when they apply to go public.
The form is a rudimentary document that, in most cases, is made up solely of facts and figures about a company's past success and its long-term goals.
The introduction to WeWork's S-1 is shown above. The sleek, image-heavy document did not fall in line with the normal format followed by companies when submitting their financials for the first time
This is one of the pages from the S-1 which Neumann's wife produced with the help of a creative director and professional photographers. She featured celebrities like Anna Faris in the document and quoted her gushing about the office space she could rent. The glossy, magazine-like S-1 did not fail to disguise the company's huge losses, however
Arianna Huffington is also included in the 220-page S-1. According to WeWork staff, the document - which is designed to run through a company's numbers and show potential investors if it is financially viable - was given a code name when it was being made
Another of the pages from the documents is shown. According to sources close to the project, a former director of photography from Vanity Fair was brought on to help with its production
Instagram influencer Aimee Song, left, was featured among other business owners. According to sources within the company, the S-1 was managed more like a magazine than a financial document designed to lay bare the company's figures
There were case studies of the other companies which use WeWork like Slack, the messaging service. Those business owners had had their portraits taken for the document
In WeWork's case, it was a glossy, pitch-deck like portfolio which featured celebrities and Instagram influencers including Anna Faris and Aimee Song.
Neumann and his wife gave it a code name - Wingspan - and it was only discussed on a 'need to know' level.
'There was this moment when all of a sudden there were code names for everything.
'Everything was need-to-know,' one said.
The thing that's so damning about all that is that it's just not the point of the document.... you're spending all this time working on the surface of it instead of the actual truth of the thing
Paltrow Neumann brought in a former director of photography from Vanity Fair to oversee the project, according to an expose in New York Magazine about her husband's ouster from the company.
She was not alone in her enthusiasm for it to be aesthetically impressive.
Adam Kimmel, the company’s chief creative officer, was unhappy with how the company’s offices looked in its official pictures, so new photographers were sent around the world to re-shoot them.
The hundreds of pages-long S-1 invites viewers to 'step into the world of We.'
It showcased the company's offices and touted the 'amenities' clients' got with them - flavored water, micro-roasted coffee, cleaning, and 'craft on draft' beer.
Insiders said the way Neumann handled the document was typical of WeWork - to focus not on the point of it, which was to prove the company's financial viability, but to jazz it up.
Professional photographers were hired to go around the world and photograph some of the company's many international offices. Adam Kimmel, the company’s chief creative officer, was unhappy with how the company’s offices looked in its official pictures, so new photographers were sent around the world to re-shoot them
The document also includes pages like this which would be more fitting for a pitch-deck or presentation. This one, in particular, describes 'the energy of we' which it says is 'greater than any one of us but inside each of us'
Some other pages included run-downs of what WeWork members would receive as perks. Among them was 'craft on draft' beer, 'micro-roasted coffee' and 'fruit water'
The picture-heavy, artsy S-1 also invited viewers to 'drop into the world of We' and it ended with a note on the company's commitment to sustainability
What the S-1 also revealed was the company's staggering losses which totalled $1.6billion in 2018. Analysts said the company was spending money 'like drunken sailors' and that something was 'wrong'
'The thing that’s so damning about all that is that it’s just not the point of the document.
'That’s the thing about WeWork: You’re spending all this time working on the surface of it instead of the actual truth of the thing,' one told New York Magazine.
Like other S-1's, it included the company's financials but they revealed for the first time its staggering losses.
The transparency startled SoftBank, its major investor.
'Something is wrong. They’re not managing their growth—they’re spending money like drunken sailors and their general and administrative costs are growing too fast,' said Nori Gerardo Lietz, a lecturer on real estate and venture capital at Harvard Business School, when the S-1 emerged.
It also cast Neumann's astronomic spending in new light. In recent years, the young former CEO has amassed an $80million property portfolio.
He also bought a Gulfstream jet and personalized it to the tune of $65million.
Before he was ousted, the company announced plans to sell it.
Neumann ignored advice from other executives not to take the company public in just three months, according to insiders.
He was determined to make it succeed, despite the company's losses. Some inside the company said Neumann had a 'Jesus' complex and is a 'phony'.
'He clearly is very smart and ambitious.
Among expenses was a Gulfstream jet with Neumann paid $60million for and to have it redesigned inside. A file image of the style of jet he bought is shown
'But he starts talking about some of the more germane aspects of the city’s land-use process, which [is] our specialty, and he has no idea what he’s talking about. Your bulls–t meter just goes off with him.
'He’s the quintessential person who doesn’t know what they don’t know,' one executive told The New York Post after he stepped down last week.
Others have told how he banned workers from eating meat in WeWork offices and spoke vaguely of creating a 'WeFamily' for all the orphans of the world.
He was also quoted as saying that he wants world leaders to 'turn to him' in the future when their countries are 'shooting at each other.'
WeWork is now expected to lay off 12,500 employees and sell-off assets in a business restructuring.
Some former executives said it was unfair the way Neumann was ousted. They say he was indulged by investors and the board for so long that he did not know that how he was operating was anything less than they wanted.
'You never got the sense that he was a bad dude. The board could have grown a pair and called Adam out on his behavior. This conclusion was perfectly avoidable 18 months ago.
'I’m angry at Softbank. You give a guy that amount of money for him to go crazier and harder and faster — and then turn around and fire him for going too crazy, too hard, too fast. It reeks of hypocrisy,' the unnamed executive said.
SoftBank owns around a third of the company. In January, it invested $10billion following the $47billion valuation.
But as news of Neumann's spending trickled out of the company and as the S-1 stoked fears among other potential investors, it applied pressure on executives to change its habits.
In 2012, Neumann and his wife bought this home in Water Mill, an enclave of the Hamptons, for $1.75million. He is also rumored to have a home in nearby Amagansett
Neumann also owns a townhouse on West 11th Street in Manhattan's Greenwich Village. He bought it for $10million
Neumann, 40, also paid upwards of $34million for four units in Gramercy - another expensive area of Manhattan