Latest news with #Descrozaille
Time of India
16-05-2025
- Business
- Time of India
IWG plans to open 40 new centers by 2025-end, pushes for partnership model
NEW DELHI: IWG , flexible office space provider, plans to open 40 new centers by 2025-end, in addition to the 10 centers it opened up between January-April 2025, said Marc Descrozaille , regional CEO of the company. "We have been in India since 2004 and and it took us all these years to get to 105 centers, with Regus initially, and later with Spaces and HQ. Conditions have changed after covid, both on the demand and the supply side. Clients want to be able to work from different office spaces. And therefore we expect growth going forward," he said. The company has recently introduced a partnership model. Operating the business has changed completely. Hence we are moving from being tenants to being partners. "We are operating the space, bringing in the clients and managing all distribution while landlords are investing into the space." Even though the company is growing its partnership model, the legacy lease and sub-lease model is still important to them and they plan to keep running existing centers on the same model unless landlords specifically want to move to the new model. "As of now, the convention model contributes about 75-80% of our overall revenue. At some point of time the ratio will be 50:50," said Descrozaille. He however admits that the margins typically for this new model will be smaller. "But on the other hand, IWG will not make the upfront investment." Descrozaille took over as the regional CEO of the Indian subcontinent in January 2025. Post that, he says that their primary focus has been on capitalising on the current market momentum. Despite being the largest player globally, flexible workspaces still account for only about 3–5% of the overall office real estate market. There's a clear opportunity to significantly scale that share, potentially up to 30% over the next five years, as projected by several industry reports. "Equally important is ensuring we have the right talent in place to support this growth. That means investing in our people—developing internal capabilities, building succession pipelines, and aligning our teams with long-term goals," he said. As for the opportunity in India, he says that as a market India today is in the top 15 for IWG in the world, the ambition, very much respecting and looking at the opportunity of the market altogether, is to be in the top three or four in the next five years. "One element which is very unique to India is the size of the market. In other countries when we think of expanding, we think of moving from tier-I to tier-II cities, but in India we can even go to tier-III and tier-IV cities. So it's very much a volume game, which is quite unique in terms of the size in India compared to anywhere else, said Descrozaille. Currently, the company has three brands in India. "We can probably introduce Signature but as of now there are no plans to bring in more brands. In 2024, we opened centers in 13 new cities. We are also moving to tier-II, tier-III cities."
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Business Standard
09-05-2025
- Business
- Business Standard
IWG to launch premium brand Signature, expand India footprint rapidly
UK-based coworking major International Workplaces Group (IWG) plans to launch its premium brand Signature in India in the next couple of years, said Marc Descrozaille, chief executive officer for the Middle East, Africa, and APAC. This comes at a time when India's office rental and flex space markets are expected to grow. He added that the company will accelerate its India footprint through acquisitions already in the pipeline. 'We've been open to discussions in the past, and we remain open to them as a way to accelerate our growth. If the right opportunity comes along with the right partner, we'll certainly consider it — it's definitely on the table,' Descrozaille said in an interaction with Business Standard on Friday. Nationwide, IWG plans to establish 40–50 new centres by the end of 2025 and intends to enter cities such as Surat, Patiala, Vijayawada, Salem, Calicut, and Thiruvananthapuram—targeting both Tier II and Tier III cities. In Bengaluru alone, the company has around 13 centres and plans to add another 18 in 2025. An additional 20 are scheduled to open in the first quarter of 2026. Currently, it operates more than 100 centres, which it aims to quadruple over the next three to five years. IWG, which competes with WeWork, Awfis, and Smartworks, operates three brands in India—Regus, Spaces, and HQ. The country is among its fastest-growing markets, prompting the company to introduce Signature, its premium coworking brand. Signature will feature a hotelification-like concept with luxury amenities such as concierge services, client insurance policies, enhanced registration procedures, and more, Descrozaille said, highlighting growing demand for high-end services in India's office space market. Globally, IWG serves around 8 million members, ranging from mid-scale businesses to 83 per cent of Fortune 500 companies. On the rental front, IWG noted that office space rates vary across micro-markets depending on multiple factors. 'In Bengaluru, however, our rentals grow at an average of 5–10 per cent annually. We expect this momentum to continue in the near future,' said Harsh Lambah, vice president – sales, South Asia, IWG.
South China Morning Post
27-04-2025
- Business
- South China Morning Post
Hong Kong's largest flex-office provider seeks deals with vacant-office landlords
The trend of companies offering flexible working arrangements to retain their top talent, far from a pandemic-era fad, is now a permanent fixture of the office property market, according to International Workplace Group (IWG). Advertisement In addition, global economic uncertainty was shaping office-space demand, driving companies away from being tied to traditional office leases, said Marc Descrozaille, CEO for Middle East, Africa and Asia-Pacific with the Switzerland-headquartered flex-desk service provider. Descrozaille credited these trends with boosting system-wide revenue for the group by 2 per cent to a record US$4.2 billion in 2024. Operating profit grew 185 per cent to US$510 million. IWG, which operates brands such as Regus, Signature and Spaces, has more than 4,000 locations across 120 countries, and expanded by a record 899 last year, with 115 of them in Asia-Pacific. With 21 centres in Hong Kong, the group is the city's largest flexible office provider. 'Offices aren't going anywhere, but their role is changing,' Descrozaille said. 'Headquarters, for example, are becoming more like creative hubs – places designed specifically for collaboration and connection, with purpose-built spaces and activities.' Advertisement 'Hybrid work is definitely here to stay and is the future. Flexibility isn't just a perk any more, it's essential. Companies will increasingly focus on giving their teams the power to choose where and how they work to keep productivity high.'
