WeWork Veterans in Residence (ViR), a partnership with Bunker Labs, is an effort to give veterans and military spouses support to grow businesses as well as access to WeWork membership privileges for six months.
Andrew Andrews-Ramirez, one of the newest ViRs, spent nine years in the US Army and Army National Guard and now leads WeWork’s Los Angeles-based cohort.
Ramirez said that he wanted to become apart of changing Los Angeles’ entrepreneurship community.
This will be LA’s third cohort, according to Ramirez. Each cohort chooses 10 veterans, or spouses of veterans, who are able to work on their business full-time and need a collaborative space in order for their company to flourish.So far, there have been about 300 applicants for the LA program.
Participants learn how to use technological tools, such as HubSpot, Asana, Quickbooks and others, in order to help support their business in the digital age.
After the six months is over, each cohort participates in a Demo Day, where entrepreneurs can pitch their business in front of angel investors, potential partners, and other professionals looking to support the veteran entrepreneur community.