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A New York-based company is turning a big chunk of downtown Vancouver real estate into shared office space for tech startups and freelancers.

WeWork announced Wednesday that it’s taking over seven floors in the Bentall III tower in a bid to attract 1,500 people to what it refers to as a “community of creators.”

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While the concept isn’t new in the city — Regus offers short-term office space at nine locations in Vancouver, for example — WeWork will offer one of the biggest single locations with a specific focus on technology, spread over 80,000 square feet of office space.

It speaks to the increasing momentum of Vancouver’s tech sector, says WeWork general manager John Slavet.

“Vancouver has always been in our sights” based on its ranking as a top global city with a hot tech sector and its location as a gateway to Asia, Slavet said.

WeWork, which started up seven years ago, now has 138 locations in 38 cities ranging from New York to London and Shanghai. Slavet expects Vancouver’s location, to be known as WeWork Burrard Station, to be open by the fall.