WeWork’s new College Park location will open on Monday, Dec. 3, kicking off an entirely new type of venture for the ambitious coworking company along the Route 1 corridor.
Already the largest private tenant in D.C., the New York-based company launched a partnership with Georgetown University earlier this year to run a coworking space near the White House.
But the College Park site will be its first location on a university campus. At 16,500 square feet, the soon-to-open location at 7761 Diamondback Dr., which used to house the college’s HVAC maintenance shop, will have more than 300 desks, private offices and conference rooms and common areas with free high-end coffee.
The move makes sense for both sides. Although it has a stunning $20 billion valuation, WeWork’s best bet to fend off would-be competitors and avoid financing problems is to keep growing at a rapid clip. It’s a classic Silicon Valley gamble, which paid off for companies like Uber and Facebook, but it depends on constantly finding new users.
Recent college graduates fit the bill. They’re more interested in hip workspaces and, in some cases, looking to start entrepreneurial ventures on a shoestring. If they get hooked on the WeWork lifestyle, they could become long-term customers — the same reason that Amazon and TargetExpress came to College Park.
For the university, WeWork’s imprimatur helps sell their vision of a Silicon Route 1, where recent graduates can start the next Oculus VR or Under Armour without leaving College Park. A trendy coworking space will complement the city’s new robotics, engineering and computer science building; a Fortune 500 innovation lab; new apartments aimed at recent grads; and a new light rail line that connects to a university-run research park.
It’s also right next to the Hotel at the University of Maryland, which makes it an obvious stop for entrepreneurs visiting campus who already belong.
If you want a sign of just how much that helps market the area, consider this: The other 11 locations in the greater D.C. area, from Dupont Circle to Tysons, are all listed under Washington on WeWork’s list of locations. But College Park is listed as its own standalone city, alongside places like Seattle and Austin.
