WeWork has filed for bankruptcy, a humbling fall for the once high-flying co-working start-up co-founded by Adam Neumann and backed by billions of dollars from Japan’s SoftBank.

The company that set out to revolutionise office real estate could not escape the combined forces of pricey leases it had signed before the Covid-19 pandemic and weak occupancy rates as hybrid working gained popularity.

WeWork and Neumann once symbolised how charismatic entrepreneurs could pick a seemingly staid sector, apply a sheen of technology and attract venture capital to get a “unicorn” or billion-dollar-plus valuation. But as losses mounted from a cascading office property bust and interest rates rose in the past two years, WeWork came to represent the worst excesses of the era of cheap money.