The Meetup-WeWork Deal Isn't All Roses

Morning Report: After the WeWork deal, Meetup struggles to retain its identity.

News broke in late November that WeWork would acquire Meetup, a deal that took many by surprise. The differences in the companies were staggering, as we noted at the time. WeWork had raised around $8 billion. Meetup raised under $20 million, total, during its life according to Crunchbase.

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The dramatic scale-difference between the two companies has mattered in the aftermath of the deal. According to Gizmodo’s Kate Conger, things aren’t meshing perfectly between the inclusive Meetup and the unicorn-racing WeWork.

One example from her piece stood out:

Employees’ fears about WeWork weren’t entirely unfounded. After WeWork acquired Meetup, employees were asked to sign a binding agreement to follow a “dispute resolution program” to resolve any disputes between the company and its workers. […]
Former Meetup employees said the document was presented to them as something they had to sign in order to keep their jobs.

Arbitration agreements are under fire in the wake of a host of sexual harassment claims in tech. Critics argue that arbitration agreements help push harassment under the rug.

There’s a quote that I love, and sadly I couldn’t find the article where I first recorded it, but it goes something like this: being acquired sucks, and it always sucks more than you think it will. It’s something that Ron Miller got out of an interviewee on stage a few years ago at TechCrunch Disrupt SF if my memory serves.

It applies here.