Marvin OnumonuThe Workplace Journal sat down with Wybo Wijnbergen, co-founder and CEO of infinitSpace, to find out more about his and the company’s background, its journey to date, and what the coming 12 months could have in store for infinitSpace.
Can you tell us a little bit about how you came to found infinitSpace?
Perhaps the easiest way of looking at it would be to say that, for the past 20 years, I’ve been in the business of delivering exceptional experiences.
This began in the leisure and hospitality space, working first for McDonald’s and then for Merlin Entertainments Ltd. After that, for five years from 2015, I was WeWork’s Managing Director for Northern Europe, helping to scale the business from its first property to more than 50 locations across five European countries.
This led us to 2020. Before the pandemic turned the world upside down, I had already been speaking with my brother Wilco – who had founded and built a number of successful tech startups in the Netherlands over the previous decade – about a new venture. And this is when the idea for infinitSpace started to take shape.
Can you tell us more about infinitSpace and the idea for the business?
Fundamentally, the idea for infinitSpace came about after constantly hearing the same thing from commercial landlords.
After I left WeWork, I’d meet with asset managers and landlords who own office buildings. We’d chat about the challenges they were facing, and there were three recurring themes.
Firstly, landlords wanted to diversify beyond traditional long-term private office leases, which were already becoming less popular even before Covid.
Secondly, they recognised that demand for flexible workspaces was on the rise, but they couldn’t yet tap into that demand themselves. And thirdly, landlords wanted greater agency and control over their properties, rather than handing everything over to an external operator.
When you consider the situation at the time, this was understandable. The nature of work has been changing notably since the turn of the century, with a huge number of businesses and employees reassessing what their workspaces are for.
The rise of remote working during the pandemic fanned these flames – if an office is just a room you can plug your computer in, why not ditch the commute and stay at home?
Over the past two decades, technology has made many aspects of life easier, but it has not made people happier. In fact, the world has become more polarised. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, loneliness was already a growing global health concern, and remote working has done little to improve the situation.
We recognised that building a global community, bringing people together to be part of something bigger than themselves, could be a powerful way to create a positive impact in people’s lives.
The risk of obsolescent commercial properties was real, and so landlords needed to act quickly to keep their properties relevant and profitable – in turn, landlords were naturally cautious in handing over free rein to an outside workspace operator.
This was the genesis of our concept of creating – and then operating – tech-enabled, white-label flexible workspace brands on behalf of landlords.
By creating premium workspaces via a trusted partnership with landlords, which were more attuned to the evolving needs of businesses and employees, taking on the sales and marketing, but allowing landlords to build their own brand and character within it, we have struck an ideal balance which will facilitate productive, fair and responsive relationships, whatever the future face of work.
Where does the ‘beyond’ brand fit into this?
‘beyond’ is our own flex brand. We launched the first beyond location in 2022 (in London’s Aldgate Tower) and now have nine different locations – four in London, three in Amsterdam and two in Berlin.
Landlords now have the choice: we are still proudly a white-label flexible workspace creator, so we can work with each landlord to create a workspace brand to their exact wants and needs. But we also understand that many landlords are seeking an established brand – and this comes with the added benefit of beyond’s strong global membership base.
You mentioned that you co-founded infinitSpace with your brother. Four years on, how has this experience been?
It’s been really interesting and extremely rewarding. Of course, we knew each other’s strengths and weaknesses better than most who go into business together. In this sense, it was less of a leap of faith than many experience when trusting one another to hold up their end of a scaling business.
Knowing a co-founder so well is a massive advantage. Even when we disagree about the best way forward, we have an intuitive understanding; it’s always clear where the other is coming from. That isn’t to say we haven’t had our moments – we both believe passionately in our field of experience and strength of view.
Both of us bring exceptional experience, knowledge and expertise in completely different fields. We have truly complementary skills and competencies, and have clearly defined our responsibilities.
The awareness that we are a naturally strong team and have different responsibilities means disagreements never evolve into disputes or fester into resentment. This makes communication easy, which is the best first step towards building something with a unified vision and direction. We are always on the same page.
Flexible workspaces have become more and more common over recent years. With such strong competition between flex providers, what do you feel separates the best from the rest?
Firstly, I’d say that the increased competition in the flex market is a positive development. It underlines the transition that we’ve seen in the office market over the past two decades – very few organisations are still willing to sign a ten- or even five-year lease for an office. Not only do they want shorter, more flexible terms, but they also want a workspace that will entice their employees to commute in.
And this is where the differentiators lie: the best workspaces offer so much more than a nice fit-out, desks, chair and superfast WiFi. They must have more than meeting rooms and breakout spaces, too.
The best flex spaces offer meaningful connectivity – real human interaction, not just digital. They offer great experiences. They inspire people to work productively. And they improve people’s wellbeing.
To deliver that, workspace providers have to combine the right services, spaces, amenities and décor with superb tech support and a true sense of community, including events and experiences.
It comes back around to the first question about my background – this is all about bringing a hospitality mindset into the workspace. That is what sets apart the best workspaces.
What has been your proudest achievement to date?
There is so much to be proud of, but if you force me to pick one, it would be the team members who’ve decided to join our adventure. Every single one of them chooses us to share their passion and their knowledge and bringing their best self to work every day. They are the driving force for why we have come so far in such a short period. And our adventure together is just getting started.
What are your plans for the next 12 months?
In a word: growth. But even faster growth than we have experienced over the past year.
Since the start of 2024, we have more than doubled the number of infinitSpace locations we have across Europe, and we have a number of exciting opportunities in the pipeline. Ultimately, the next 12 months are all about putting our foot down – we’ve built a brilliant team of people who are all pushing each other on, and the appetite is there to form more partnerships with landlords and open more workspaces.
Of course, at the same time, our focus is always on ensuring that members within our existing workspaces are receiving the best possible experience. We’re nothing without a thriving community of members, so we can never afford to lose sight of the fact that we have to constantly go above and beyond to serve them as best we can. When our members are successful, as a result that follows, we are successful.
