WeWork closing four Denver locations to ‘rightsize’ its footprint

BOULDER — WeWork, a New York-based coworking firm with a major presence in Denver, will move into the Canyon 28 building in Boulder. The company will occupy the bottom three floors — more than 30,000 square feet — of the four-story office space at 2755 Canyon Blvd., developed in 2017 by Lou DellaCava of Boulder-based LJD Enterprises Inc. Two-thirds of the top floor of the building is currently occupied by MLB Advanced Media, which operates a technology hub for Major League Baseball. The organization will soon take over the remaining space on the floor. “If the fourth floor had been available, (WeWork) probably would have taken that too,” DellaCava said. WeWork’s 12-year lease began Jan. 1. “They are working with some space planners now and expect to be occupying the space in the fall — hopefully around September or October,” he said. The Boulder office will be WeWork’s first Colorado location outside of Denver. The company has operations, or is committed to leases, in more than 600,000 square-feet of office space in nine Denver buildings.

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BOULDER and LONGMONT — AstraZeneca PLC is closing its Colorado operations, which includes facilities in Boulder and Longmont, and laying off 210 employees. The locations at its Boulder Manufacturing Center, 5550 Airport Blvd., and the Longmont Manufacturing Center, 4000 Nelson Road, are being “permanently terminated due to the closing of manufacturing operations there in the entirety,” AstraZeneca wrote in a WARN notice letter to the Colorado Department of Labor and Employment. Most terminations are expected for March 22, although some may continue after that date. Layoffs include roles such as manufacturing specialists, production technicians, quality control analysts and quality control senior analysts. Affected employees are being notified of their individual dates of termination. AstraZeneca did not return a request for more information by the time of publication for this story. The closure of the facilities is a blow to the region’s bioscience community, said Clif Harald, executive director of the Boulder Economic Council. He said when the company first announced that it would acquire the Amgen facility in Boulder in 2015, the community was very excited about the work they were doing. (Soon after, AstraZeneca also acquired the Amgen location in Longmont.) In Boulder, Harald said AstraZeneca was manufacturing immunotherapy treatments for cancer. “We were very excited about that,” he said. “It makes the disappointment about their decision even greater. Our thoughts go out first and foremost to the employees affected by the decision.” Harald said that the Economic Council will work with the county, city of Boulder, state departments and the Colorado Bioscience Association to help provide resources and support to employees affected by the closure. “This can be a volatile industry,” he said. “I think the [area’s bioscience] industry will see this as part of the risks and challenges of doing business in cutting-edge devices and pharmaceutical products. But this is big and affecting hundreds of employees, and that’s where my thoughts go first. As to the reputation for the Denver metro or Boulder metro bioscience industries, I think most seasoned industry observers and workers will see this as part of what can happen.” If there is a silver lining to the disappointing news, he said, it’s that the Front Range has a strong bioscience community that has been struggling with a shortage of talented labor and that AstraZeneca’s loss of employees could be the gain of other companies. “It’s a robust industry, and my hope would be these employees will see the opportunity for new employment before very long. That’s a cause for some optimism,” he said.

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