The coworking company attracting big corporations
Networkia rents offices to larger companies setting up in Barcelona or Madrid; with nine centres, it now has its sights set on Lisbon
Networkia is a coworking company specialising in large corporations. In other words, its offices are home to multinational companies that are established in Barcelona or Madrid and that do not want to take the risk of making large investments in real estate. Networkia offers them infrastructure and space management and maintenance services, which is becoming big business. In fact, since the pandemic, the corporate coworking sector has hit double-digit growth. Networkia had a turnover of 10 million euros last year, two million more than the previous year, and is also recording increases of over 10%. “We hope to maintain this dynamic in the coming years,” says Juanjo Martínez, founder and CEO of the company.
Based in Barcelona, Networkia was founded in 2012, in the midst of the global financial crisis, after its founder saw the office investment company he worked for collapse as a result of the real estate bubble.
To launch Networkia, he single-handedly acquired small coworking centres in Madrid and Barcelona from a single operator who wanted to divest from the sector. Martínez raised enough capital to buy the offices thanks to the fact that he had gained prestige with a couple of financial institutions while he was a manager at the other company. In addition to bank loans, Martínez contributed all his savings and the mortgage on his house. “That’s how we started out, as a risky operation,” Martínez laughs.
The beginning
Martínez invested in the coworking sector when it was in a very embryonic state. The first two years were not easy, but since 2015 the company has bloomed. “When the economy was starting to recover, smaller and less solid companies began to look at coworking as a less risky solution, so little by little it evolved,” the founder says. The next profile that came to trust coworking was that of large corporations wanting to set up in Barcelona but save themselves the risk of huge investment. And that is when the model took off and Networkia opened increasingly more exclusive locations.
At the moment, the company has offices in an entire building in Portal de l’Àngel, Gran Via de les Corts Catalanes, Plaça Catalunya and in the Zurich building in Diagonal de Barcelona.
The fact is that the financial crisis boosted the sector and the covid crisis ended up putting the final icing on the cake. “The pandemic taught us that there are circumstances unrelated to your business that can hit you suddenly. And businesses saw that they need to have the maximum possible flexibility, also in the management of office space,” explains Martínez.
The emergence of teleworking due to the pandemic also helped the coworking office model. Networkia has now positioned itself among the top ten companies in Spain in corporate coworking, competing with large international groups and other partners with investment funds behind them. In fact, it is one of the few companies in which the capital and ownership is owned by the founder himself. “Our profile is not common, because a lot of investment is required for each new centre,” he explains.
Networkia allocates an average of two million euros to set up a new centre: “We look for external financing for only 30% of each project, particularly from small investors and traditional financial institutions,” explains Martínez.
The Networkia brand is that of a fully equipped space that has extra services such as maintenance, catering, specific meeting rooms, parking spaces, etc. Martínez is now planning to open a branch in Lisbon.
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