Tag: Loom House

Merlin to Add 13,000 m2 of Coworking Space in Madrid & Barcelona by 2020

28 February 2019 – Idealista

Merlin Properties is expanding in the coworking sector, where it operates under the Loom brand. The Socimi led by Ismael Clemente currently has three shared offices in Madrid, spanning 3,500 m2 in total, and it is planning to open its next space, spanning 1,200 m2 on Calle Eucalipto, 25, also in the Spanish capital, in June.

The listed company also intends to open 1,600 m2 of coworking space in Torre Glóries, the office block that it owns in Barcelona, where its tenants will work alongside several high-profile operators, such as Facebook, Dynatrace and Oracle.

In September, Merlin is going to open 2,000 m2 of coworking space in the Salamanca neighbourhood of Madrid and before the end of the year, it will add 1,500 m2 of shared office space in WTC Alameda in Barcelona.

In 2020, the Socimi is also planning to open 1,100 m2 of shared work space in Torre Chamartín in Madrid and another 2,000 m2 in the 22@ district of Barcelona.

Merlin owns 31% of Loom House, which is managed by the siblings, Paula and José Almansa.

Original story: Idealista (by Custodio Pareja)

Summary translation by: Carmel Drake

Co-Working Spaces in Madrid & Barcelona Rise by 71% YoY to September

23 October 2018 – Eje Prime

Co-working spaces are on a roll in Spain. This global phenomenon in the office market is also reflected in ratios that keep on growing. In Madrid and Barcelona alone, 55,900 m2 of this type of flexible office space was leased between January and September, which represented an increase of 71% with respect to the same period last year.

According to the Flexible spaces in Spain study, compiled by the consultancy firm Cushman&Wakefield, during the first nine months of the year, 26,800 m2 of co-working office space was leased in Madrid and 29,100 m2 in Barcelona.

This growth is the result of the commitment to co-working spaces by large corporations. According to explanations provided in the report, “at the beginning of the 2000s, small spaces predominated, occupied by self-employed people and freelancers; nowadays, those spaces still exist, but the potential of the co-working phenomenon has led to companies such as Banco Santander (Openbank), Accenture and Everis, amongst others, also using flexible spaces for some of their activities”.

The boom in flexible and shared office space intensified in 2014, the first year of the recovery. Besides large corporate groups, which rely on this office model for optimising their real estate resources and the productivity of their employees, international co-working giants have arrived in Spain in recent years to create supply to meet the growing demand.

WeWork and Spaces (owned by Regus), global specialists in this segment, already have expansion plans for the domestic market. The same is happening with the main Socimis, such as Merlin and Colonial, which, in addition to promoting brands that manage co-working spaces, are also adapting several of their properties to convert them into flexible offices.

Madrid and Barcelona are the focus of this market. WeWork already has 35,000 m2 of office space leased in the two capitals. It is managing one fifth, 7,000 m2, from 22@, the technological hub of Barcelona, one of the epicentres of co-working in Spain. Spaces is planning to grow in the same district, where it already has 6,000 m2 of space across several buildings.

In terms of the large Spanish real estate companies, Merlin and Colonial are, to date, the firms that have backed this new trend most convincingly Both have entered the sector by purchasing or teaming up with specialist companies this market. Colonial acquired the brand Utopicus at the end of 2017, as revealed by Eje Prime, and now has a commitment to open ten new co-working centres from 2019, which will span a total of 15,000 m2 between Madrid and Barcelona.

Meanwhile, Merlin has launched the brand Twisttt, through Loom House, a Spanish shared office manager in which the Socimi owns more than 30%. Other domestic players such as Inmobiliaria del Sur have already made investments in this sector. In October last year, the Andalucian real estate firm launched iSspaces, a co-working centre in Sevilla measuring 1,800 m2 (…).

The identity of the next players to enter the stage is a mystery, but the fact that co-working has a long journey ahead in the office market in Spain and around the world is very much a reality.

Original story: Eje Prime (by J. Izquierdo)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Twisttt: Merlin Launches New Co-Working Brand Together with Loom House

20 April 2018 – Eje Prime

Merlin doesn’t want to get left behind in the race between the real estate companies in the co-working sector and so has taken the lead. The Socimi led by Ismael Clemente is going to launch a new co-working brand, under the name Twistt, together with Loom House, the company specialising in shared work centres, in which the Socimi acquired a stake of more than 30% last May. As sources at Merlin have explained to EjePrime, the first space under this new co-working brand is going to be opened in a building that the Socimi owns in Calle Princesa, Madrid.

The Socimi is going to open its first Twisttt space at number 5 Calle Princesa, in a building that it already owns. “Under this new brand, Merlin is going to contribute the assets and Loom House is going to be responsible for managing the co-working space”, explain the sources. There will be 1,100 m2 of shared office space, which can house up to 150 users. Twisttt’s first space is expected to be fully operational by June.

Although the sources at Merlin are not yet able to define the route map that the two groups will adopt with Twisttt, the plans involve opening at least one more co-working centre before the end of the year. “Unlike Loom House, which is an ecosystem focused on innovation, Twisttt is a much more practical ecosystem”, explain sources at the group. Twisttt will belong to the same company as Loom House, Innovación Colaborativa, and so will not be a new company.

This new project comes almost a year after Merlin purchased a 31% stake in Loom House. Paula Almansa and Jose Almansa are the founders of Loom House, a concept that seeks to differentiate itself from a “simple co-working because we wanted to go one step further”, explained its co-founder. “It is a space destined to innovation, to sharing ideas, that allows you to reflect” – explains Almansa-; if all you want us a workspace with wifi and a coffee shop, there are other options ahead of Loom House”.

Loom House is the spin-off of Impact Hub, the first co-working that was created in Spain by ten entrepreneurs (including the Almansa siblings). “After seeing that the co-working concept was starting to be accepted in Spain, we got down to work with Loom House, opening our first space in the ‘Real Fábrica de Tapices’ in 2016”, say sources at the group (…).

Now, the company is preparing to go one step further with the launch of its second Loom House space. This new centre, which will span 1,500 m2 and which will be able to house more than 190 users, is going to be located at number 9 Calle Huertas, in the Las Letras neighbourhood, in the former Chamber of Commerce building. Work to remodel the asset has already begun and is expected to be completed by in June.

The co-working war 

The entry of Merlin into the co-working sector is not an isolated or anecdotal event. Ismael Clemente’s Socimi is following in the footsteps of Colonial, which acquired a majority stake in the Madrilenian based firm Utopicus (specialising in coworking) last October, to develop a new branch of its business, as Eje Prime revealed.

Currently, Utopicus has three centres in Madrid, located on Calles Duque de Rivas, Colegiata and Doctor Esquerdo (…).

Now, with the objective of generating a profit from its investment, Colonial is going to open three more Utopicus centres, on this occasion in Barcelona (…).

Original story: Eje Prime (by Custodio Pareja)

Translation: Carmel Drake

Co-Working Operators Leased 5-Times More Office Space in 2017

8 February 2018 – Expansión

Operators of co-working offices are gaining strength in Spain and multiplied by five times the space leased in 2017, to 40,500 m2.

The international co-working giants –WeWork, Regus, Glue Concept and Busining– are claiming their space in Spain and have recorded a milestone in the leasing of co-working office space in Madrid and Barcelona.

Last year, 40,500 m2 was leased for use by these kinds of work spaces, which represents a five-fold increase in the figure recorded the previous year, according to explanations provided by the real estate consultancy firm Savills Aguirre Newman.

Sources at the consultancy firm explain that the arrival of international operators has definitively reactivated the so-called serviced office sector in Spain, which includes business centres and co-working spaces.

Specifically, Regus, WeWork, Busining and Glue Concept closed 15 office space rental operations in Spain last year. Those operators opted for new and renovated buildings, with large and bright spaces, locations that are well-connected by public transport and with excellent services for their users in the vicinity of the offices, explained Ana Zavala, National Director of the Offices Agency at Savills Aguirre Newman.

By city, Madrid accounted for 82% of the surface area leased, whilst Barcelona represented 18%. By number of operations, 53% corresponded to Madrid, compared with 47% to Barcelona.

For the consultancy firm, the participation of this new model in the global office calculation for Madrid and Barcelona still has room for growth, as it currently accounts for around 5%. Thus, whilst in Madrid and Barcelona, the leasing by these types of business accounted for 3% in 2016, in London, they represented 10%.

“The growth in terms of leasing has been very significant in 2017, but the model is still very new in Madrid and Barcelona, and will depend on the success and demand that is generated. London is a much more mature market in terms of co-working in Europe and there the market share has amounted to around 9%-10% of the volume leased over the last two years”, said Zavala.

For the National Director of the Offices Agency at Savills Aguirre Newman, the benefits of these spaces are attractive for SMEs and micro-companies used to working in a collaborative way (…).

New players

In an effort to take advantage of the new needs in the market, the large Spanish Socimis Colonial and Merlin have also taken their first steps into this business. In this way, in October, the Catalan Socimi closed an agreement to acquire a controlling stake in the co-working platform Utopic_US. That agreement also includes the development of a strategic plan through successive capital injections by Colonial. Utopic_US, founded by 2010, has three centres in Madrid and will open another one in Barcelona within the next few weeks.

Also in October, Merlin announced the purchase of a stake in Loom House. In the case of the Socimi led by Ismael Clemente, its alliance with Loom House involves jointly converting some of the buildings in Merlin’s portfolio into co-working office spaces. Loom House currently has two co-working centres in Madrid, one in the Atocha area and another on Calle Huertas.

Original story: Expansión (by Rebeca Arroyo)

Translation: Carmel Drake