"One-Person Companies" Reshape Office Market Ecology

Securities Times Reporter Wu Jiaming

Currently, “One-Person Companies” (OPC) are quietly emerging and have become a new focus for innovation and entrepreneurship in the era of artificial intelligence (AI) across various regions. For the office building market, the rise of OPC communities is also reshaping the ecosystem of office spaces.

At present, many places are promoting the construction of OPC communities. Previously, the “Shenzhen Action Plan for Building an AI OPC Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Leading Area (2026–2027)” was officially issued, proposing that by the end of 2027, more than 10 OPC communities with an area of no less than 10,000 square meters each will be established, gathering over 10,000 AI innovation and entrepreneurship talents, making Shenzhen the top choice for AI innovation and entrepreneurship nationwide.

So, what do OPC communities actually look like? Our reporter’s on-site investigation found that OPC communities are quite different in style from traditional, busy office buildings.

At π Creative Space in Yuehai City, Luohu, Shenzhen, a single workstation might be a company. Entrepreneurs exchange ideas in a relaxed atmosphere, which is very different from traditional office areas. According to reports, the first batch of eight companies has already moved into π Creative Space, with more than 10 interested companies, focusing on AI marketing, embodied robots, and other fields. Liu Wenhui, the person in charge of π Creative Space, told reporters that currently, eligible companies can rent space for free.

In several OPC communities in Futian and Nanshan districts, Shenzhen, some are renting out workstations to entrepreneurs. The monthly rent for some OPC community workstations generally ranges from 600 to 1,000 yuan. Some of these communities are converted from old industrial parks, while others are located in traditional commercial office buildings. However, unlike traditional office leasing, community operators also hold activities such as industry matchmaking and technical exchanges, rather than simply providing physical office space.

The rise of OPC communities inevitably brings to mind shared offices. According to Zhang Xiaoduan, Deputy Dean of Centaline Research Institute, shared offices mainly focus on flexible work needs of small and micro enterprises or companies operating across regions, emphasizing space flexibility, community services, and value-added enterprise services. OPC communities tend to target small-scale startups, with similar requirements for space and lease flexibility and cost control. Additionally, tech-heavy and AI-focused OPC communities emphasize resource integration and ecological collaboration, enabling individual or core entrepreneurs to quickly access supply chain support and related integrated services. Therefore, ultra-low costs, industrial clusters, computing power support, and policy assistance are key elements that distinguish OPC communities from shared offices.

Currently, including Shenzhen, most key cities’ office markets still face challenges of massive supply and high vacancy rates. The emergence of OPC communities seems to be one of the “solutions” to high vacancy rates in office markets. However, it is also important to consider whether there is a “client poaching” issue between OPC communities and traditional office operators.

“OPC communities are not yet mainstream in the office market,” said Manager Chang, who has been working as an office and shop intermediary in Nanshan Science and Technology Park, Shenzhen, for nearly 10 years. He noted that in the past one or two years, demand for small workstations and micro-offices has indeed increased. Some office buildings that previously only offered whole-floor rentals are now being subdivided, but the demand remains scattered. He also emphasized that OPC communities target different customer groups than traditional office buildings. However, many small tech companies are still willing to rent Grade-A office buildings during periods of relatively low rent. Traditional office operators should adjust their strategies in time and offer more services to these startups.

Yu Lingqu, Executive Director of the Financial Development and State-Owned Enterprise Research Institute at China (Shenzhen) Comprehensive Development Research Institute, believes that under the significant reduction of R&D barriers brought by AI, individual entrepreneurship is gradually becoming an important supplement to the technological innovation system. “In the future, the innovation structure may present a ‘large enterprise + OPC’ collaborative model, where large enterprises provide platforms and application scenarios, and individual entrepreneurs become new nodes of innovation.”