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Philippines is IWG’s biggest coworking space market in ASEAN
By JON VIKTOR D. CABUENAS,GMA NewsInternational Workplace Group. (IWG), a multinational provider of flexible workspace solutions, is on track to achieve 90% occupancy in Philippine locations by the end of the year, making the country its biggest market in the ASEAN region.
Of the total 7,000 seats available in 28 coworking spaces the company owns across the Philippines, 23 are in Metro Manila and five are in the provinces.
“We expect to end the year with 90% occupancy for the total business in the Philippines regardless of maturity,” IWG Philippines country manager Lars Wittig told reporters in Taguig City on Wednesday.
“Last year was a very good year also, but I don't think we were over 85%. Ninety percent is totally (doable this year).”
IWG operates two brands in the Philippines, including Regus—a leading global workspace provider—and Spaces, which has a dedicated team overseeing background logistics and services for clients.
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The company is banking on the huge growth potential of coworking spaces in the Philippines, which has been expanding by an average of 40% in the past several years, Wittig noted.
“That's for the shared office space, and that is higher than the global trend. That is in terms of space, square foot,” he said.
More buildings are expected to allocate more spaces to lease out to flexible working solutions from the current share of 7%.
“Four to five years ago, it was only 2 to 3% of all commercial space that was shared,” said Wittig.
“Today it is close to 7%. And 10 years from now, we expect one-third to be coworking space, meaning shared anywhere in the world, anywhere in the Philippines,” he added. —VDS, GMA News