Sandeep Mathrani, who has been WeWork’s CEO since 2020, has been appointed the Chairman of the board as well. The position has been vacant for months since Marcelo Claure vacated it.
Gujarat-born Mathrani, a real estate industry veteran, was given the top executive role after the co-working startup’s disastrous attempt at going public nearly three years ago.
His primary duties had been to reverse the company’s fortunes and improve its corporate governance structures after founding CEO Adam Neumann gave up majority voting control in September 2019.
This promotion comes after yesterday’s announcement of Raj Subramaniam as the heir to the CEO role at FedEx. Subramaniam has worked at the American delivery company for 31 years before being named successor to founder Fred Smith.
In contrast, Mathrani was first brought on board to WeWork in 2020 as the CEO, after he had successfully revived GGP Inc. upon being named CEO in 2011. GGP had filed for bankruptcy in 2009, but by 2018, Mathrani had ensured enough growth for the company to be bought out by Brookfield Property.
WeWork also announced the appointment of Saurabh Jalan to their board. Jalan has worked with SoftBank since 2015, and was in charge of overseeing the Japanese firm’s investments in companies such as WeWork and T-Mobile US.
