Flexible office provider Orega has appointed former Essensys chief operating officer Alan Pepper as chief executive.
Pepper will join Orega at the end of August and take over from Zach Douglas, who co-founded Orega and has been chief executive for more than 22 years.
Douglas will remain active in the business as executive chairman and will work closely with Pepper on delivering Orega’s continued growth plans.
Pepper has 20 years’ experience in the flexible and serviced office industry in the UK and internationally. During his career he has worked across investment, space provision and supply.
At Essensys, Pepper was chief financial officer before becoming chief operating officer. Prior to that he spent 11 years at Avanta, the last four of which were as chief executive. He was also previously chief commercial officer at Regus UK.
Orega operates 25 centres totalling 610,000 sq ft across the UK in partnership with landlords and corporate occupiers. In the past 12 months the business has opened six new locations and predicts 2023 will be its biggest year of growth to date with recent openings including Marlow in Buckinghamshire, Holborn Gate in Midtown, Mark Lane in the City of London and No 2 St James’ Gate in Newcastle.
It plans to double in size over the next three years.
Douglas said: “As both the market and working practices remain uncertain, many businesses are looking at flexible space options that do not tie them into long leases and other long-term financial commitments, but they also want high-quality places to work and to attract staff. Landlords are increasingly realising this and the Orega management agreement model, offering extremely high-quality flexible office space but via a partnership agreement has become increasingly popular with landlords and corporate occupiers.
“We believe this trend will continue to grow and we have a number of new sites we are looking closely at now.”
Pepper added: “I believe Orega’s management agreement model is the way forward for delivering high-quality flex space. It provides landlord partners a solution for the provision of operationally intensive flexible workspace that monetises their space with a high-end office product and amenity while enabling them to retain control of their asset and brand. At the same time, it provides business occupiers with the security that, via Orega, they are engaging with the owner of the building.”
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