WeWork China gets $200 million investment, appoints new acting CEO

Office-sharing startup WeWork's China unit has received an additional $200 million in funding from existing investors and has appointed shareholder Trustbridge Partners' executive Michael Jiang as its acting chief executive officer.

Private equity firm Trustbridge and Singapore state investor Temasek Holdings had held talks with the Chinese unit of the troubled co-working startup over increasing their stake in the company to take majority ownership, Reuters reported in January.

The latest fundraiser was led by Trustbridge, WeWork said. Trustrbridge will take a majority stake in WeWork China, and WeWork will retain a minority stake with active and participating interest in WeWork China, WeWork added.

The New York-based startup said last month it had slashed its cash burn rate almost in half from the end of last year and obtained a $1.1 billion commitment in new financing from SoftBank Group Corp.

The company shelved its initial public offering in 2019 after investors grew wary of its losses, business model and corporate governance, further leading to the resignation of co-founder and former chief executive officer Adam Neumann.

WeWork has since undergone an enormous management shake-up and remains enmeshed in lawsuits over a $3 billion tender offer to existing shareholders.