Members using a hot desk can pay less than £800 a year for it, while others pay about £3,000.
Deputy Laine was managing director of technology company C5 Alliance at the time the Greenhouse opened, as part of an initiative called Digital Guernsey, spearheaded by then-president of Economic Development, Deputy Kevin Stewart.
But the service now was different to what it is today, said Deputy Laine, and it was no longer appropriate for the States to be supporting to such an extent.
‘The idea was for this technology hub incubator to accelerate start-ups and take advantage of what was a kind of a digital revolution at the time, and everyone subscribed to that,’ he said. ‘But what we have today is a co-working space. Maybe if Kevin had been re-elected, it’d be different.’
Incubators in other places were ‘not just about desks’ and provided financial services or deals with software development companies, or be linked to a fund or angel investors.
‘If you’re lucky enough to get accepted into it you’ll progress through it. That’s not what we’ve got.’
There were other companies offering co-working in the island, now, he said, and since the announcement of plans for the closure, he said many people had been coming up with ideas.
‘We also have a lease that’s running out on the building next October [2027] so clearly, this is the time to decide.’
However, Mr Stewart, commenting on Facebook, did not support the idea of closure.
‘To close it makes no sense,’ he said.
‘It may need reshaping and restructuring but to close down a hub that already has traction and tenant relationships is lunacy.’
He went on to say that closing it with no successor ready to take over was ‘a strange way to convince outside investors and talent that digital is a serious, durable priority. It reads as instability, not efficiency.
‘Any old fool can shut down an operation. The skill comes with nurturing and developing the project and making it fit to deliver towards the £150m. objective in the Economic Plan for digital.’
The situation needed creative thinking and leadership, he said, ‘which unfortunately are severely lacking in this States’.