The History of Co-Working Spaces

Co-working goes way back probably even before people were aware of what co-working is. There were books published in 1628 that praised coworking. However, formally, the history of co-working started from hackers.

 

1995

In Berlin, a group of hackers called C-base gathered to exchange ideas and codes. With this, they offer a physical location where people with the same mindset can meet together and work together.

1999

In 1999, Bernard DeKoven, a video game designer, coined the word “coworking”. He preferred a non-competitive environment for workers to gather compared of the usual office politics in a company.

2002

Austrian entrepreneurs established the first coworking space in the world. It was in an old factory in Vienna. They named it Schraubenfabrik, which was the first ever communal place for entrepreneurs.

2005

The very first official coworking space was founded in San Francisco by Brad Neuberg, a programmer. The coworking space was called Spiral Muse located in San Francisco. Unfortunately, it closed in 2006. However, several co-working spaces sprouted in Europe.

2007

The term “coworking” was seen on Google’s database. This means that people who search for coworking has massively increased during 2007.

2010

The very first #CoworkingDay was celebrated to honor the very first time a coworking place has opened its doors in 2005.

2012

In 2012, more than 2000 coworking spaces are available globally. In addition, it is also the same year where 93,000 tweets used the hashtag #coworking.

2013

In 2013, there are about 3000 coworking spaces that opened worldwide. In addition, more than 100,000 people have been working at these coworking spaces. Moreover, the very first health insurance plan for coworking spaces was launched in the same year at Ontario, Canada.

With the evolution of coworking spaces, it is safe to assume that it will not stop there. Coworking spaces will continue to expand and increase the number of constituents who will rely on coworking services. If curious, it is possible to rent a coworking space in Hong Kong. See for yourself the wonders of working in a coworking space.