The company expanded at a breakneck pace throughout the 2010s, opening locations in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Seattle, Tel Aviv and London.

Its spending was largely financed by SoftBank, which bet that spending freely on start-ups would allow the companies to grow faster than their rivals and establish dominant positions in their industries. SoftBank invested more than $10 billion in WeWork.

The company became synonymous with co-working, a trend that was embraced by millennials doing freelance work or engrossed in start-up culture. Workers would type away on their laptops in open-floor work spaces or duck into glass conference rooms to take meetings. They were places for people to chat and share ideas all while sipping on the cold brew and kombucha that were on tap.

In August 2019, WeWork sought to go public. It was the largest private tenant in Manhattan and one of the most valuable start-ups at a time when Silicon Valley investors were pouring fanciful amounts of money into young companies.

But as Wall Street learned more about governance issues at the company and its huge losses, the initial public offering was shelved the next month. Mr. Neumann stepped down as chief executive soon after. With the failure to go public, the company was running out of money and needed a bailout. In October 2019, SoftBank provided a lifeline that valued the company at $7 billion.