CommonGrounds Workplace is an enterprise-grade Workplace-as-a-Service (WaaS) company that collaborates with companies and asset owners needing flexible space solutions and services in multiple U.S. cities. On January 16, 2019, the company announced its initial $100 million Series A funding to support the company’s aggressive two-year growth initiatives. The company raised an additional $40 million from existing investors to expand its Series A funding round.
Existing CommonGrounds investors include Pacifica Enterprises, Inc., a San Diego-based real estate investment firm, that coordinated the initial funding and seed money for the company. Major investors also include The Davidson Group, formerly Davidson and Associates, a leading developer of educational and entertainment software based in California, and Mohamed Alabbar, founder and Chairman of Emaar, one of the largest real estate development companies in the world, based in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
In a year, CommonGrounds has grown from one open location in Carlsbad, Calif. to 21 workplace locations in various stages of opening. To date, locations open and under construction comprise approximately 610,099 square feet in 20 cities and 11 states. The company has signed over 294,000 square feet of new leases in seven cities including Midtown Atlanta, the Chicago Loop, downtown Los Angeles, Philadelphia’s Center City, South Lake Union in Seattle, and two Washington D.C. locations. CommonGrounds is in current negotiations and talks with asset owners across the U.S. to expand its footprint to two million square feet in roughly 50 locations within 24 months.
“CommonGrounds is offering the only true enterprise-grade, adaptive or Hackable Environment in the flexible office marketplace,” said Jacob Bates, chief executive officer for CommonGrounds. “Being the second mover to an industry that has so much demand, we see the unaddressed opportunities within the current market. We developed a series of enterprise-grade products and services for companies in various stages of growth while delivering a high-quality brandable environment very much like a Fortune 1500 headquarters.”
CommonGrounds offers various flexible space solutions and services to address the need for coworking, private offices, and team rooms for companies of all sizes, and an HQ On-Demand or Headquarters-as-a-Service (HQaaS) solution to provide stand-alone, private, flexible offices. Additional services include hosted events, speakers, lunch and learns, and facility management all powered by CG+, its mobile application. The app allows a member to manage the company’s subscription, team, book rooms, post jobs and can be white-labeled for asset owners and HQaaS members. Each workplace offers enterprise-grade quality furniture, fixtures, security, and technology infrastructure while capturing each location’s unique character through CommonGrounds’ human-centric designs.
“Our investors understand that enterprise and Fortune 1500 companies will fuel the demand for flexible office and that CommonGrounds is primed and ready,” said Bates. “With our proprietary building technology, we can handle a company’s rapid growth while minimizing construction costs and detrimental downtime without sacrificing customization, sound mitigation, or quality. Our furniture, walls, technology, and infrastructure is nearly 90% faster to reconfigure, and costs roughly 75% less than our competitors.”
CommonGrounds developed and patented its demountable wall system in partnership with manufacturer, Tecno out of Milan, Italy, to address the customization, quality, sound mitigation, and security needs of an enterprise company. The highly configurable wall system, when compared to a traditional storefront glass build-out, saves a company on construction costs in significantly less time. The company proved this at CommonGrounds’ Downtown Minneapolis Workplace when looking to transform 391 linear feet, 11 rooms, into an open plan. The traditional storefront construction quote was $290,400. CommonGrounds, with its proprietary wall system for the same renovation, came in at $59,635 and was 90% faster to deliver. For its HQaaS member in Denver, CommonGrounds reconfigured four offices into two larger executive offices, removing roughly 25 linear feet of walls within four hours with the workplace fully operational and undisturbed during the renovation.
About CommonGrounds Workplace
CommonGrounds Workplace is a national Workplace-as-a-Service (WaaS) company offering flexible workplaces, office, HQ on Demand, coworking, and property services for companies of all sizes and asset owners. The company’s enterprise-grade, human-centric workplace typologies create highly productive and brandable environments designed to satisfy the quality and technology needs of the Fortune 1500 companies.
Headquartered in San Diego, Calif. since 2015, the privately held company completed its Series A funding, totaling $140 million and targets to expand its footprint to two million square feet across roughly 50 locations within the next 24 months. For more information, please visit: cgworkplace.com
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