Walmart owned Flipkart is now looking for a new office in Bengaluru that will stand as a separate entity from its sprawling head office inside the Bengaluru’s Embassy Tech Village. However, this new office may land you in a co-working space and not in a traditional rental office.
According to Economic Times (ET), Flipkart is pursuing talks with quite a few co-working spaces to rent over 3000 desks in the IT city. If there is any truth to this report then this will mark e-commerce giant’s first possible transaction with the co-working space industry.
“The firm has floated the RFP (request for proposal) and is in talks with at least five operators to fill in the larger requirement,” a person familiar with the matter told ET on condition of anonymity, claiming further that WeWorks and CoWrks are among the contenders that are being considered.
So, should we be really surprised that Flipkart that is now owned by the world’s largest retail company is heading towards a co-working space. Well, not really given that today big corporates are lapping up co-working space like never before and are one of the biggest contributors to the co-working industry’s revenue.
As per a recent survey, big corporates shedding their bias has spurred the co-working industry’s growth up to 300% in the last three years.
Most Analysts claim that big companies are increasingly opting for co-working space because it gives them flexibility to either expand or shrink the space at any moment. This flexibility is usually absent in the case of a traditional rental office.
Walmart owned Flipkart’s search for a new office space has come at a time when Indian government has introduced tough e-commerce policies. These policies have imposed new curbs & restrictions on online players in order to bring more level playing field in the industry.