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The Office Problem Almost Every AI Company Has: Paying for Space They Don't Use
Why fast-growing tech startups with teams spread across multiple countries are rethinking how they manage their workspaces — and what they're doing about it.
There's a pattern that repeats itself in almost every rapidly scaling AI company: they have people in four countries, but they're still paying for a fixed office as if everyone came in every day.
Not because they're careless. But because for a long time, there was no real alternative.
Until now.
The typical scenario: global team, local office logic
Picture a growing AI company. It has team members in Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, and Spain. The team is mostly remote, but needs in-person time: for culture, for focus, for intensive sprint weeks.
In their home country, they have their own office. They pay for it every month. Between $3,000 and $4,000. For 40 people who, in reality, come in two or three times a week.
And in the rest of the countries, their employees work from home or hunt for cafes with good wifi.
The result: they overpay where they have infrastructure, and have nothing where they actually need it.
Why this problem costs more than it looks
The cost of a fixed office isn't just rent. It's everything that comes with it:
- Underutilized space. If people come 3 days a week, you're paying for 5.
- No real usage data. Who went? How often? When is demand highest? Nobody knows.
- Friction for distributed teams. Those in other countries have nowhere to go when they need to leave home or meet with a local client.
- Uneven company culture. Those who go to the office feel part of something. Those without an office, don't.
For an AI company competing for global talent, that imbalance matters.
What they're looking for when they start seeking solutions
When People or Operations teams start exploring alternatives, they usually show up with two or three concrete questions:
- Can I give employees access to coworking spaces in multiple countries without building infrastructure in each one?
- Can I see who uses what, when, and where?
- Can I turn this into a benefit that encourages in-person time without forcing anyone?
That third question is the most interesting. Many tech companies don't want to go back to mandatory office time. But they do want coming in to feel like something worth doing, not a burden.
What changes when you adopt an on-demand coworking model
The logic is straightforward: instead of paying for a fixed office each month, you pay for actual use. Your employees book when they need it, in the space that works best for them, in whatever city they're in.
But the biggest shift isn't about costs. It's about visibility.
With a flexible workspace management platform, your People team can finally see:
- Which days have the highest demand (and anticipate needs)
- Which countries use the benefit most (and understand where in-person collaboration matters most)
- Whether the benefit is actually being used (not just whether it's being offered)
That data is what lets you make real decisions about culture, benefits, and even office expansion.
The detail that makes the difference: model flexibility
Not every company has the same usage pattern. Some teams come in Tuesdays and Thursdays. Others have members who travel between countries and need to book different cities depending on the week.
An on-demand model lets each employee adapt their usage without creating administrative headaches for your People team. No manual access management, no coordination with individual spaces, no processing separate invoices by country.
Everything centralized. Everything visible. Everything simple.
A benefit that also drives retention
Here's something companies discover after adopting this model: it's a retention tool disguised as an operational benefit.
When an employee in Brazil can book a coworking space near their home, work alongside their team, have solid internet, and a focused place to get work done — that has real value. Not as corporate policy. As lived experience.
And when your company can measure whether that benefit is being used, you can talk about it with proof. Not "we offer coworking" but "78% of our Brazil team used the benefit last quarter."
That matters in a culture report to investors. And it matters when you're trying to win someone choosing between two job offers.
Is your company at this point?
If you have teams in more than one country, you're paying for a fixed office that isn't used at full capacity, and your People team has no real visibility into how your spaces are actually being used — you're in the scenario we just described.
The good news is there's a solution that doesn't require building your own infrastructure in each city, negotiating contracts with individual coworking spaces, or managing access manually.
At Desky, we work with tech and AI companies that have exactly this problem. Here are two ways to get started:
🏢 Office in a cowork, fewer headaches
If you know you need a fixed base — a place your team can use regularly, without managing a traditional lease — we have offices in the region's best coworking spaces. You quote, we handle the rest.
⚡ Desky On Demand: an Airbnb for coworks, in one click
For teams that don't need a fixed office but need real flexibility: book from hundreds of spaces in different cities and countries, whenever you need it, with no contracts or commitments. Your employees choose the space, book with one click, and you see everything from a single dashboard.
Do you have a team in more than one country and need real workspace flexibility? This article is for you.