Before Cubes.Co grew into a 15-site coworking network across three states, Tobi Skovron was in Los Angeles, building a business from home and hitting the limits of doing it alone.

He didn’t want to pour cash into rent, fitout and security deposits, so he plugged into a shared workspace in Santa Monica instead.

He believes it helped shape the path to the successful sale of his business.

Skovron had spent years in the US and was already using the sort of product he would later bring back to Australia. At first, the appeal was practical.

▲ Communal breakout space inside Cubes.Co’s Collingwood workspace, one of the operator’s Melbourne sites.

He needed a better, more collaborative place to work without the burden of a conventional lease. Then came the lift of the place itself.

“I was lit up as a business owner, as an entrepreneur, and someone that just wanted to be around really good people and be inspired daily,” he says. “I was lifted up by the energy of the space and the people in it. Travis Kalanick, who founded Uber, was in my space. Even the people who founded Snapchat were in my space.”

Years later, he still describes the environment as pivotal.

“I believe with my whole heart that delivered me my first exit.”

He came back to Australia after exiting an earlier business, put the proceeds into the concept and started Cubes.Co on his kitchen table in 2016.

▲ The kitchen and lounge area inside Cubes.Co’s Collingwood workspace, designed as a shared hub for members and guests.

Today, the business says it attracts more than 35,000 accounts a month across 15 sites and 70 staff, with its first New South Wales hub now operating from King + Kent at 347 Kent Street in Sydney’s CBD (pictured below).

The site spans 2629sq m across levels 11 and 12 and, according to Skovron, hit 45 per cent occupancy within its first 30 days.

Sydney, Skovron says, was the “most important missing piece” in a network spanning Melbourne and Adelaide.

Landlords come into focus

What’s pulling landlords in isn’t the softer language around community or hospitality.

It’s a more practical shift in what larger occupiers now expect from a building.

Skovron says companies are increasingly asking landlords to provide flexibility inside the asset itself—not just a fixed floorplate on a long lease, but access to workspace they can scale up and down as staff move in and out.

“A lot of the tenants that want to take space today are demanding the landlord have a level of flexibility in their asset,” he says.

In practice, he says, the request can sound like this: “I need 100 desks at any one time to drop in and out. I’m not going to pay for it, but that’s what you’ve got to provide in order for me to come to your building.”

It gets close to the heart of the office market’s current reset.

The old model relied on committed floorplates and long terms. More occupiers now want smaller footprints, better shared amenity and room to flex without carrying the cost of underused space.

For operators like Cubes.Co, it opens a lane between traditional leasing and what tenants now expect.

Cubes.Co hasn’t grown by buying buildings, it’s grown by moving into them.

A meeting room inside King + Kent in Sydney, one of the dedicated spaces within the operator’s new CBD workspace.

▲ A meeting room inside King + Kent in Sydney, one of the dedicated spaces within the new CBD workspace.

Some landlords hold equity in the business. Others, Skovron says, came through existing relationships after seeing the product up close.

Cubes.Co has 12 sites in Melbourne, two in Adelaide and one in Sydney, with a third Adelaide site coming, one Brisbane site committed and work under way on two more.

By the end of 2026, Skovron wants “20 or 21 sites operating”.

Investa’s view helps explain why owners are paying attention.

Its general manager Johanna Watson calls the King + Kent deal “a strong endorsement of the building’s repositioning and the leasing momentum we’re seeing, as the market continues to favour premium, well-amenitised workplaces that build community and support modern ways of working”.

Adelaide proves model could travel

Sydney may be the headline move, but Adelaide looks like the more revealing proof point.

South Australia, Skovron says, has been “the most successful part of our business to date”, driven by founder-led demand, larger corporate users and a business community he describes as unusually connected.

“Adelaide is a one-degree town,” he says. “So everyone knows everyone.”

Soundproof phone booths inside the 30 Pirie Street workspace in Adelaide, giving members private space for calls within the wider shared office.

▲ Soundproof phone booths inside the 30 Pirie Street workspace in Adelaide, give members private space for calls within the wider shared office.

It matters because it cuts against any easy assumption flex demand only sits in Sydney and Melbourne CBD towers.

Skovron says SA carried risk, but one he was prepared to take because he believed in the market.

Once Cubes.Co found its footing there, he says, the local business community embraced it.

Sydney, by contrast, is “more transactional”, in his view, even if years of people asking when Cubes.Co would arrive gave him confidence an audience was already waiting.

Leaner offices, better experience

Skovron says the shift is showing up most clearly among occupiers nearing the end of older leases and asking how much office they really need.

The customer mix now runs from solo founders to larger corporates, but the bigger draw is no longer just a desk, it’s access.

A business can take space in one city, then drop into Cubes.Co sites in Melbourne, Adelaide and Sydney, with Brisbane next, without paying for duplicate offices across each market.

More are shrinking their footprint, cutting cost and moving out of older, underused space into workplaces with better amenity, stronger shared areas and more flexibility around how teams come and go.

▲ Collingwood boardroom and meeting space, designed for team sessions and client-facing work away from the open floor.

In his view, the gain isn’t simply aesthetic, it comes from spending less on space sitting empty and more on an office people actually want to use.

“They might be taking less space, spending less money,” he says, “but the overall experience is 10 times what it was.”

He argues workplace quality now carries more weight in hiring as well, with businesses competing not only on salary, but also on proximity, amenity and flexibility.

External numbers help frame the shift. Colliers data shows hybrid-flex offerings in Sydney rose 34 per cent in the year to September 2025, while national growth reached 4.9 per cent, the strongest annual lift since 2020.

Australia has about 200 flex operators, but only 21 per cent expanded their footprint

Growth came with scars

None of it came easily.

From the outside, coworking can look simple. Inside the business, Skovron describes a high-intensity logistics operation, with daily movement, timing issues, tech problems and service expectations far beyond a standard lease.

Open-plan workstations inside the Collingwood workspace, where desks sit alongside enclosed meeting rooms and breakout areas.

▲ Open-plan workstations inside the Collingwood workspace, where desks are alongside enclosed meeting rooms and breakout areas.

Victoria left the deepest scars. At one point, he says, the business “died like six times”, surviving because shareholders and landlords backed the longer-term picture.

Those scars make the Sydney opening more telling.

For Skovron, the bigger point isn’t one fast lease-up, but the evolving role of office space.

“The role that the office will play well into the future is a place of collaboration. It’s a place of connection. It’s a space of belonging and it’s a place where people come to do their best work,” he says.

Leasing Transaction

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15 Apr 26

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