Flexible workspaces provider Smartworks has picked up over 3 lakh sq ft office space across two new facilities in Gurgaon and on the Delhi-Noida Expressway through long-term leases spread over 9 years. With these new leases, Smartworks’ total footprint in India has touched 2 million sq ft with a total investment of $30 million so far.

With these new spaces, Smartworks’ Delhi-NCR presence has increased to over 4 lakh sq ft spread across 6 centres as the company already has 2 centres in Gurgaon and one each in Delhi and Noida.

Both the new centres, picked up through lease payment mode, will cumulatively add seating capacity of 6,500, furthering the company’s expansion plan and taking the total number of desks to over 40,000 across 20 centres. The new leases are part of the company’s plans to expand its operations to 20 million sq ft over the next 3-5 years.

“In less than 3 years since our inception in April 2016, we have grown from one 9,800 sq ft centre in Delhi to 2 million sq ft across India now. We have been moving steadily towards our target of 20 million sq ft. The deal pipeline is robust and we are optimistic of achieving the portfolio size with solid occupancy levels,” Neetish Sarda, founder, Smartworks, told ET.

Both Gurgaon and on Delhi-Noida Expressway centres are expected to be operational by April.

In November, the company had picked up an 82,000 sq ft on lease at Fleet House, a commercial property on Andheri-Kurla Road in Mumbai for a total tenure of 15 years. This workspace consists of a seating capacity of over 2000 and has been pre-booked by 40%. With the addition of the new centre, Smartworks’ total footprint in India has reached 1.5 million sq ft.

“Gurgaon and the Delhi-Noida Expressway are two of the most important business hubs in North India, with several large domestic and international firms, across sectors, either establishing or expanding their footprint here. Both our new centres aim to address the continuously growing demand for agile workspaces here,” Sarda explained.

Several large enterprises that are focused on optimizing their overall costs for office spaces prefer agile workspaces as it leads to cost savings of more than 15%-30% on the enterprise level.

According to a recent report by property consultant Cushman & Wakefield, in 2018, co-working players leased nearly 5 million sq ft of space. This is the highest ever annual leasing recorded for the co-working segment.

Flexible space operators have grown rapidly in the past two years, reaching a total footprint of nearly 40 million sq ft in the first half of 2018 in 16 major Asia-Pacific cities including Delhi NCR, Mumbai and Bangalore. India is expected to emerge as one of the world’s largest co-working markets by 2022, showed a recent report.