[gbear605]

It's successful in the sense that it could raise prices to make a profit and there's a possibility that it would still have enough customers left. Unlikely the oft-discussed "selling dollars bills for 90 cents" companies, WeWork is creating real value that its customers will pay for. The question is still open whether that value is more than the operating costs, but it's at least possible. I'd bet against it though.

[gwern]

It's also a successful business in that their growth plans could potentially deliver real value and economies of scale (talking purely hypothetically here). There's a very big difference between a startup which is profitable but would be far more valuable if it could grow using investments, a startup which is premised on economies of scale and so which fails if it can't grow fast enough to take off from its runway, and a startup like Theranos where the tech did not and probably could never work regardless of how many customers it had.

Even if We would fail for lack of further investments (because it's type #2), that doesn't mean it was #3, a Theranos. In both #1 and #2, Softbank has a lot of leverage over Adam, and in both it's kind of a game of chicken: neither Softbank nor Adam want to see lack of cash cause We either permanently curtail its potential (#1) or die (#2).

[rightbyte]

Uber is also creating real value for its customers.

[bsder]

And Uber could be profitable and create real value for investors. The problem is that, in that case, Uber isn't a unicorn and isn't worth the billions already thrown into it.

[rightbyte]

Ye, but depends on how much loans Uber has if they can ever be profitable. But in theory yes. Just sack 95% of the RnD departement and raise fare prices untill supply and demand even things out.