India’s leading co-working startup, Smartworks, has inked a real estate deal to rent 5.00.000 sq. ft. space for an upcoming co-working project in the city of Pune. Although the project will become operational only in 2021, once the project becomes operational it will help Smartworks in consolidating its presence in critically important city of Pune. This will be company’s fifth facility in Maharashtra’s cultural city, which also happens to be an IT hub and a place where startup industry is growing in leaps and bounce.
Smartworks’ upcoming co-working space in Pune will be located in Koregaon Park – one of the upscale and posh locations of the city. It also needs to be noted that this is one of the largest deals in terms of space signed by any co-working space provider in India. The deal comes closely in the heels of Awfis’ announcement to start a brand new center in Pune, which will be spread across 33,000 sq. ft. This will be Awfis’ 10th center in Pune.
Smartwork had raised $25 Mn from Singapore based Keppel Land in a series A round only few weeks back. Currently, the company has 23 operational centres in nine cities, offering a total of about 43,000 workstations spread over 2.3 million sq. ft.
Commenting on the latest deal, Mr. Neetish Sarda, Founder of Smartworks said,” We are delighted to partner with Amar Builders and Pristine Properties for our largest coworking space in the country. We have received an incredible response from Pune, and with robust office space demand, we believe the city is all geared up to lead the next wave of growth. This new facility will add to our growing portfolio and help us meet the office space demand from the enterprises in the region.”
Off late, the nascent co-working industry has witnessed some hectic activities – from Oyo’s offcial entry into the co-working market to concerns following the collapse of WeWorks’ IPO. But industry experts are optimistic that the industry will continue to grow at steady pace amid all the ups and downs.