WeWork to go public with $9 billion valuation

A WeWork logo is seen outside its offices in San Francisco (Reuters)

Once a dazzling 'unicorn' valued at $47 billion, WeWork began to unravel as the firm lost cash and cancelled a planned 2019 share offering, with the ex-CEO pushed out -- albeit with a generous package.

WeWork announced on Friday it plans to enter public markets through a merger transaction that raises $1.3 billion, valuing the office-sharing firm at a fraction of the sum discussed in its unsuccessful pre-pandemic effort to go public.

The move comes two years after the former high-flying office-sharing company went into a spectacular tailspin that led to the cancelling of a planned public share offering and a bailout by Japanese investment firm SoftBank.