a16z invests in Adam Neumann's residential real estate management startup Flow, sources say ~$350M at a $1B+ valuation, the firm's largest-ever individual check
Our nation has a housing crisis. — The demographic trends driving … Ryan Deffenbaugh / Protocol : Can proptech go with Adam Neumann's Flow? Edward Ongweso Jr / VICE : NIMBY Marc Andreessen Gives WeWork's Adam Neumann $350 Million to, Uhh, Solve the Housing Crisis Nate Oseep / Louder Vic! : VC Delenda Est Theo Wayt / New York Post : Investors slam WeWork founder Adam Neumann's ‘disgusting’ comeback Vish Gain / Silicon Republic : WeWork's Adam Neumann gets a big flow of a16z cash for latest venture Max Chafkin / Bloomberg : Andreessen Horowitz Thinks It's Time for Adam Neumann to Build Anita Ramaswamy / TechCrunch : a16z says ‘WeBack’ to WeWork's Neumann with its biggest check ever Jose Montes de Oca / Newslit Daily : 🏠 Adam Neumann Gets a New Backer Emma Roth / The Verge : WeWork co-founder lines up $350 million A16Z investment for a new billion-dollar real estate venture Idan Ben Tovim / Geektime : Adam Neumann raises $350 million for his new real estate startup Dan Brockwell / Earlywork : 🌞 From Marketing to Product Management Ibukun Ogundare / Coinspeaker : Andreessen Horowitz Indicates Interest in Adam Newmann's Yet-To-Be-Launched Residential Real Estate Company Flow Silicon Canals : WeWork founder Adam Neumann's new startup Flow gets unicorn status before its launch; raises funding from a16z Lucas Abreu / abreu : Loucos ou visionários? O grande dilema do Venture Capital Ahmad Rifai / Sumbu Botol : Kenapa a16z Rela Mengucurkan US$350 Juta untuk Startup Baru Adam Neumann? Shadine Taufik / Tech in Asia : Adam Neumann bags $350m from a16z for new project Catherine Thorbecke / CNN : WeWork's former CEO has a new startup, reportedly valued at more than $1 billion Los Angeles Times : WeWork founder Adam Neumann secures $350 million for new housing startup Cromwell Schubarth / Silicon Valley Business Journal : Marc Andreessen is betting $350M that WeWork's Adam Neumann can help fix the ‘housing crisis’ — just after Andreessen helped kill a multifamily housing proposal Samar Marwan / Fast Company : Here's what to know about Flow: Adam Neumann's newly flush-with-cash real estate startup TechCrunch : Tech industry reacts to Adam Neumann's a16z-backed return to real estate Joanna Glasner / Crunchbase News : Flow Might Fill A Niche, But Touting It As A Housing Crisis Solution Doesn't Sit Well Berber Jin / Wall Street Journal : Andreessen Horowitz Backs Adam Neumann's Real-Estate Startup Joey deVilla / Global Nerdy : Adam Neumann, a16z, and the importance of “south-pointing compasses” Colin Lodewick / Fortune : Why did one of history's greatest tech investors just give $350 million to a real estate startup headed by disgraced WeWork founder Adam Neumann? Financial Times : The Second Coming of Adam Neumann Lauren Leffer / Gizmodo : Mr. WeWork Starts Another Real Estate Company Ashley Capoot / CNBC : Andreessen Horowitz announces plans to invest in Adam Neumann's new residential real estate company Marcelino Pantoja / Measurement : Qubit: Compound's Manual on Venture Capital JD Alois / Crowdfund Insider : Andreessen Horowitz Bets Big on Adam Neumann's Flow with $350 Million Investment Douglas Fruehling / San Francisco Business Journal : SFBT Digest: Unity answers AppLovin; Neumann's big new haul Tweets: @tier10k : $FLOW jumps 4.20% on news that a16z has invested in Adam Neumann's new real estate co with the same name https://twitter.com/... @pitdesi : A16Z is leading a $350M (their largest ever) round into Adam Neumann's new real estate company Flow. Flow bought 3,000 rental units in S Florida, Nashville, & Atlanta. Business model is unclear, seems like wework for housing + some ownership for renters https://a16z.com/... @fintwit_news : Elizabeth Holmes, founder of Theranos, lost investors $1 billion. She faces up to 20 years in prison. Adam Neumann, founder of WeWork, lost investors $11 billion. He then raised $350 million for his next startup. https://twitter.com/... Jacob Silverman / @silvermanjacob : This is incredible. Flowcarbon — Adam Neumann's tokenized carbon credits company, for which a16z led an investment round in May — was “paused indefinitely” last month. https://businesscloud.co.uk/ ... Dare Obasanjo / @carnage4life : Andreessen Horowitz is investing $350 million in the WeWork guy's new real estate startup at a $1B valuation before it has even launched. Adam Neumann just raised $70M for a Goddess Nature Token web3 startup 2 months ago. Did it already fail? Did it pivot? https://a16z.com/... Will Upton / @wupton : The difference is that Neumann used WeWork as a personal piggy bank but in a technically legal fashion... Holmes literally defrauded investors and tried to cover up the fraud... which is illegal... https://twitter.com/... @a16z : Today, we're announcing our investment in Flow, which aims to disrupt the current residential real estate market by connecting people to build communities around their homes. Read more from @pmarca 👇 https://a16z.com/... @nextdoorsv : 6/25/2022: building more housing will MASSIVELY decrease our home values and our quality of life 8/15/2022: hey did you know our nation has a housing crisis? https://twitter.com/... @brantlymillegan : may turn out that “previously-canceled” is an asset not a liability for founders, b/c you're unlikely to be canceled again (at least for the same reason), aka you have cancelation-immunity. the never-canceled, otoh, live in fear & are therefore more constrained https://twitter.com/... Ethan Mollick / @emollick : Good day to remember that failed serial entrepreneurs get much better deal terms from venture capitalists than first-time founders, despite the fact that their startups perform worse at the time of funding! https://twitter.com/... Marc Andreessen / @pmarca : https://a16z.com/... 🔥🔥🔥 @hassankhan : oh COME ON https://twitter.com/... @luke_metro : BREAKING: a16z fires Adam Neumann from his new real estate startup after he tries to build apartments in Atherton @buccocapital : Adam Neumann raising $350M from a16z, their biggest check ever Fool me once... https://twitter.com/... Kate Brodock / @just_kate : THIS IS DISGUSTING. @a16z's largest check going to a (straight white male) founder of one of the most toxic companies we've seen. Firms like this perpetuate over and over again a traditional system that favors a small, homogenous set of founders. https://www.nytimes.com/... Clark / @canteringclark : Nah, bad call. Holmes was actually a lying fraud. Neumann was an eccentric Icarus who tried to build a business on feelings rather than finance. https://twitter.com/... @litcapital : When you see Adam Neumann raising an outrageous amount of capital at an outrageous valuation yet again https://twitter.com/... Sara Mauskopf / @sm : Everyone dunking on a16z but I thought WeCrashed was really good and it seems reasonable that it would cost $350M to produce the sequel @jessthevc : lord give me the confidence of a founder who lost $40 billion and can still raise from a16z Zara Rahim / @zararahim : i will never not be shocked at white founders, who despite completely imploding their companies and leaving employees with nothing but severance and astronomical COBRA payments, will almost always get another fat check and profile in a publication of their choosing https://twitter.com/... Edward Ongweso Jr / @bigblackjacobin : It's gonna be really funny when Adam Neumann locks renters into ten year leases and someone goes...wait a minute https://twitter.com/... @cbrowell : @bigblackjacobin So he's going to let renters gain equity (better check with the SEC)? tax breaks (some states offer this for rent - but he should check with IRS? What other benefits of homeownership? I can paint the walls without permission? A renters mortgage? Lock in rent for 30 years? Andrew Gazdecki / @agazdecki : Really impressed at @a16z's masterclass on how to tarnish a venture capital firm's brand, lots of startup founders once really admired this firm and that's gone now. Takes years to build a brand, days to destroy one. Tom Gara / @tomgara : Give Adam Neumann another roll of the dice, we need to see where this one goes https://a16z.com/... @martinvars : Contrarian thought of the day: if Adam Neumann got one of the best VCs in the world to give him $350m for his new real estate venture maybe he is not quite the messianic idiot that We Crashed depicts. @contrarian8888 : Definition of insanity is doing the same mistake again and again https://twitter.com/... Kontra / @counternotions : @charlesarthur “Unclear”? If you corner the market in nothing, do you not have something? Seems clear to me. Ben Kepes / @benkepes : Adam Neumnn? I mean, really? VCs are hilarious sometimes, they just can't help themselves... @mdudas : .@a16z + adam neumann partnering on flow to “create a system where renters receive the benefits of owners” https://a16z.com/... Brian Brackeen / @brianbrackeen : “Business Model Unclear” = 350 million. 😂 Meanwhile women and minorities are being put through the gauntlet for small checks. Yikes. I'm hell bent on changing this. https://twitter.com/... Parker / @pt : I never bought that WeWork was more than a property management company, & I'm skeptical “community” is a new category in multi-family. But if consenting adults want to throw $350M at that, I propose we all simply take a deep breath & invest in some SaaS while they're distracted. Brian Brackeen / @brianbrackeen : This is embarrassing. https://a16z.com/... Steve Kovach / @stevekovach : Plus: Neumann tried this “college dorms for adults” thing at WeWork and it bombed. Will Oremus / @willoremus : so what do you call this system where women and black founders get almost no VC money but adam neumann gets unlimited funding for life? VCs: ["the aristocrats" voice] the meritocracy! https://twitter.com/... Sam Biddle / @samfbiddle : sorry but everyone is missing the funniest part of this blog post: “Can Starlink Save the American Mother?” https://a16z.com/... Joe Weisenthal / @thestalwart : “The market will regulate itself” The market: https://twitter.com/... Roberto Baldwin / @strngwys : and also, WTF is this bullshit? I've lived in apartments for the better part of my life and always ended up making friends with my neighbors. There was always a community Moving into a house three years back, we essentially had to ambush neighbors to introduce ourselves. https://twitter.com/... Edward Ongweso Jr / @bigblackjacobin : What do you get when one VC billionaire inspired by Star Trek to turn everything into a commodity meets another billionaire inspired by a kibbutz to turn everything into a rental. Stay tuned folks, I'm sure it's gonna fucking suck. https://www.vice.com/... Alex Hern / @alexhern : did Adam Neumann get $350m because Marc Andreessen didn't realise the anti-housing screed he wrote was public Ale Resnik / @aleresnik : Today @pmarca announced @a16z's investment in Flow, and I got many questions since @a16z is our largest shareholder... So thought to clarify here. Our thesis is similar: we believe in a better (and different) future for Home. However... open 🧵 Dan Primack / @danprimack : Two things that can both be true: 1/ Adam Neumann was indeed a visionary who transformed a massive, staid industry. 2/ Adam made huge mistakes (not fraud, but still brutal errors that hurt employees) and it's still not clear how much he's willing to own some of those mistakes. Gergely Orosz / @gergelyorosz : Between pivoting to become “the” web3 VC - investing in companies that turn to be Ponzi schemes like Axie Infinity, and dumping tokens on retail - and now writing their biggest ever check to a con artist with a terrible track record, I've lost all previous respect for a16z. Why? https://twitter.com/... Garrett M. Graff / @vermontgmg : This is so dumb: https://twitter.com/... Eli Pariser / @elipariser : Spending $350M just to troll everyone seems like a lot but to each his own https://www.nytimes.com/... Heidi N. Moore / @moorehn : Good time for me to repeat my (very accurate) theory that anything that A16z backs is destined to fail spectacularly. https://www.nytimes.com/... Janine Sickmeyer / @myfriendjanine : Babe wake up new Adam Neumann investment just dropped. https://twitter.com/... Eric Newcomer / @ericnewcomer : Minor point: Is this right? Was Andreessen Horowitz an early investor in Facebook? I thought they got their shares in Facebook through Instagram and Marc Andreessen's board seat? The firm was founded five years after Facebook was https://twitter.com/... @damedoteth : pretty depressing to see a16z enabling adam neumann to make wework 2.0, but for personal housing https://twitter.com/... Katie Notopoulos / @katienotopoulos : ?????? “you rent an apartment, but: it's a soulless experience; do you even meet your neighbors, much less have any friends in your complex? Does it feel like home, or just a place to sleep? Are you proud to bring friends and family to visit, or hesitant?” https://a16z.com/... Max Chafkin / @chafkin : in all seriousness, this analysis is...odd, and kind of seems like something conceived by people who don't have a lot of experience renting apartments https://a16z.com/... https://twitter.com/... @quantian1 : Nowhere in this article does a16z mention... what... the company they gave $350mm... does? Is this another one of those fractional ownership tokenization for apartments people reinvent every 2 years? https://twitter.com/... Molly Wood / @mollywood : Hahahaha ... we're baaaaack! https://twitter.com/... Eliot Brown / @eliotwb : A couple thoughts on valuation. It's nothing new that VC firms will invest big in repeat founders, even failures. Few datapts, but the $1 B the NYT cites is well below another recent repeat founder, Marc Lore, whose nascent food delivery is at $3.5 B https://www.wsj.com/... Eliot Brown / @eliotwb : in Cult of We, we highlighted Andreessen Horowitz with helping create the cult of the founder among VCs, which fueled WeWork's irrational rise https://twitter.com/... @coloradotravis : “The backing of a16z, considered royalty among early-stage investors, is a powerful sign of support...” Yeah well. As an early stage investor myself, I'd say this definitely *used to* be true. Thing is, clownbag fuckery is off thesis for me. https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/... Mary Branscombe / @marypcbuk : the VC crypot mess has reached iced tea with blockchain in the name levels again https://twitter.com/... Tony Fratto / @tonyfratto : Setting aside this investment...America, man...the ability to get capital to fund an idea — no matter who you are or what you did before (!) — doesn't exist like this anywhere else in the world. A huge reason why we create & develop the biggest ideas here is capital access. https://twitter.com/... Alex Konrad / @alexrkonrad : it's time to build* *give 350M to Adam Neumann to retry WeLive in web3 https://twitter.com/... Conor Sen / @conorsen : That being said, there's nothing in here at all. GPT-3 could've generated it: https://a16z.com/... Robin Wigglesworth / @robinwigg : Raise rates by 10% now. https://a16z.com/... Eliot Brown / @eliotwb : 🤔 “Adam, and the story of WeWork, have been exhaustively chronicled, analyzed, and fictionalized - sometimes accurately.” https://a16z.com/... Marshall Steinbaum / @econ_marshall : The capital market is a uniquely efficient engine for allocating scarce resources. https://twitter.com/... @tylerlinklevoss : I'm sure I'm missing nuance but Neumann basically got a16z to spend $350 million to make his personally owned apartment complexes better to live in? https://twitter.com/... @riddle245 : Wait the same guy that did WeWork and apparently tanked the entire company from a 47B to 4B valuation now through incompetence to the point where he made his own company pay him $6M for his trademark “We” just got $350M from A16z. Okay. https://twitter.com/... Arpit Gupta / @arpitrage : Seems like WeWork, but for homes. WeLive? https://www.nytimes.com/... https://twitter.com/... https://twitter.com/... @nycsouthpaw : good luck to the Andreesen Horowitz LPs who will be spending part of their Monday attempting to convince themselves this is a good idea https://twitter.com/... Gunjan Banerji / @gunjanjs : “It's often underappreciated that only one person has fundamentally redesigned the office experience and led a paradigm-changing global company in the process: Adam” -@pmarca https://a16z.com/... https://twitter.com/... @buccocapital : Quiet part out loud. We want our cut “Only through a seismic shift in the way industry relationships are structured and the mechanisms through which value is delivered can we address the underlying problems of the current system and build the solution” https://a16z.com/... Jordan Zakarin / @jordanzakarin : Marc Andreessen, who just melted down over a few potential new homes near his mansion, is now investing in the WeWork guy's new corporate landlord startup. https://a16z.com/... @thomasborgers : Difficult to come away anything but confused by this from a16z: https://a16z.com/... This is a different startup from FlowCarbon that just raised $70m? You get to the end of this post and still unsure what it does? Myles Udland / @mylesudland : This is just incredible writing. https://a16z.com/... https://twitter.com/... Maya Zehavi / @mayazi : WeLive v2 seems like a rent2own model only with Andreeson money rather than Softbank. Expect tokens to flow as real estate prices start dropping. https://a16z.com/... @ivanthek : Andreessen announces their investment in Adam Neumann's Flow without saying what it actually does. https://a16z.com/... Leigh Drogen / @ldrogen : Proving once again that the more money you lose on Wall Street the more they give you the next time The lesson here is to always go big (if you can set aside your conscience) because no one cares about the small wins and losses https://twitter.com/...