Bengaluru’s co-working hotspots are shifting from Central Business District (CBD) areas to Outer Ring Road, Electronic City and Whitefield area.
“Most of the co-working spaces in the city in the last five years were concentrated mostly in the CBD area — MG Road, Residency Road, Millers Road, Vittal Mallaya Road, Langford Town, etc. However, as the demand for co-working industry saw rapid increase in the city, it is gradually expanding to other business hubs like Outer Ring Road, Whitefield, North Bengaluru and Electronic City,” Trivita Roy Director, Research & REIS, JLL India told BusinessLine .
The main reason for co-working operators to move beyond CBD is the availability of space, currently occupied by large corporates.
“Both Whitefield and Outer Ring Road are the key business hubs in Bengaluru and co-working operators are leveraging on their established business environment and infrastructure. The co-working spaces in these locations provide large floor plates and the option to accommodate large number of seats at rents relatively lower than the prime locations,” explained Roy.
“At the moment, most of the operators are providing managed offices in these locations for the corporates. Managed offices are dedicated spaces for the firm with all other facilities of co-working spaces. Corporates opt for these spaces for their immediate or temporary space requirements due to easy scalability and flexible lease terms,” she added.
Similar to CBD, areas like Outer Ring Road, Electronic City and Whitefield are well-connected. The upcoming metro lines, along with access to workpool due to the surrounding residential locations, are driving the demand for office space.
Rising demand for co-working space
The demand for co-working spaces has shown more than 30 per cent increase y-o-y in the city. Co-working spaces hold 10 per cent share of the total office space leased in Bengaluru in 2019.
According to Roy, “Occupancy of these co-working spaces is also good. On an average, at least 60 per cent of the overall space provided by co-working players in Bengaluru was occupied by the end of 2019. Along with corporates, small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and start-ups were the other occupiers.”
CBD at the moment remains the hub for co-working spaces. The share of supply of coworking spaces increased in CBD in 2019 and it is expected to increase by 24 per cent in 2020. Roy said, “CBD continues to remain a favourite location especially with SMEs and start-ups as it is well connected by Metro rail. Similarly locations such as Indira Nagar, Koramangala, HSR Layout, Old Airport Road and Domlur, which are part of the Secondary Business District (SBD), witnessed good volume of growth in co-working spaces in 2019.”