Homegrown Co-Working Space Startup 'Friyey' Shuts Down Amid Decreasing Demand

Linkedin/ Yogesh Thore

New Delhi: Homegrown co-working space platform Friyey has shut down operations owing to funding crunch amid decreasing demand. In a LinkedIn post, Yogesh Thore, Founder and CEO of Friyey, said that with mixed emotions, "I share the news of the closure of Friyey, a venture that has been close to my heart for the past 4 years."

"We build this company in gratitude - for our customers, our Restaurant Partners, our Investors who trusted us from the beginning, and last but not least, my team members without whom none of this would have been possible," he added.

Founded in 2019, the Pune-based startup saw more than 500 restaurant partners and over 24,000 remote workers that accessed its spaces. Friyey, which also featured on Shark Tank India, took a unique approach to transform restaurants, pubs and clubs into coworking spaces in the morning hours, according to a report in Inc42.

In 2020, Friyey raised seed funding from angel investor Tarun Bhalla. The Indian startup ecosystem reported the lowest six-month funding in the last four years, in the first half of this year at $3.8 billion across 298 deals -- a decline of nearly 36 per cent as compared to the second half of 2022 ($5.9 billion), according to a latest PwC India report.