Airbnb, Inc. is an American vacation rental online marketplace company based in San Francisco, California. Airbnb maintains and hosts a marketplace, accessible to consumers on its website or via an app. Through the service, users can arrange lodging, primarily homestays, and tourism experiences or list their properties for rental. Airbnb does not own any of the listed properties; instead, it profits by receiving commission from each booking. The company was founded in 2008 by Brian Chesky, Nathan Blecharczyk and Joe Gebbia. Airbnb is a shortened version of its original name, AirBedandBreakfast.com.
The company has attracted criticism for increasing rent prices in cities where it operates, and creating nuisances for those living near leased properties. In response, the company has attracted regulatory attention from cities such as San Francisco and New York City, and the European Union. It has also faced challenges from the hotel industry and other, similar companies.
Shortly after moving to San Francisco in October 2007, roommates and former schoolmates Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia came up with the idea of putting an air mattress in their living room and turning it into a bed and breakfast. In February 2008, Nathan Blecharczyk, Chesky's former roommate, joined as the Chief Technology Officer and the third co-founder of the new venture, which they named AirBed & Breakfast. They put together a website that offered short-term living quarters and breakfast for those who were unable to book a hotel in the saturated market. The site Airbedandbreakfast.com officially launched on August 11, 2008. The founders had their first customers in town in the summer of 2008, during the Industrial Design Conference held by Industrial Designers Society of America, where travelers had a hard time finding lodging in the city.
Computer programmer Paul Graham invited the founders to the January 2009 winter training session of his startup incubator, Y Combinator, which provided them with training and funding in exchange for a small interest in the company. With the website already built, they used the Y-Combinator investment to fly to New York to meet users and promote the site. They returned to San Francisco with a profitable business model to present to West Coast investors. By March 2009, the site had 10,000 users and 2,500 listings.
In March 2009, the name of the company was shortened to Airbnb.com, and the site's content had expanded from air beds and shared spaces to a variety of properties including entire homes and apartments, private rooms, and other properties.
In April 2009, the company received seed money from Sequoia Capital. In November 2010, they raised financing from Greylock Partners and Sequoia Capital in a Series A round, and announced that out of 700,000 nights booked, 80% had occurred in the previous six months.
At the 2011, South by Southwest conference, Airbnb won the "app" award. In October 2011, Airbnb established an office in London, its first international office.
Due to the growth of international end-users, in early 2012, Airbnb opened offices in Paris, Milan, Barcelona, Copenhagen, Moscow, and São Paulo. These openings were in addition to existing offices in San Francisco, London, Hamburg, and Berlin. In September 2013, the company announced that it would establish its European headquarters in Dublin.
In November 2012, Airbnb opened an office in Sydney, its 11th office location, and announced plans to launch the service in Thailand and Indonesia. In December 2012, Airbnb announced its strategy to move more aggressively into the Asian market with the launch of an office in Singapore.
In November 2012, Airbnb launched "Neighborhoods", a travel guide of 23 cities that helps travelers choose a neighborhood in which to stay based on certain criteria and personal preferences.
By October 2013, Airbnb had served 9,000,000 guests since its founding in August 2008. Nearly 250,000 properties were added in 2013.
In July 2014, Airbnb revealed design revisions to the site and mobile app and introduced a new logo. The logo, called the, Bélo, is intended to serve as a symbol of "belonging", and consists of four elements: a head which represents people, a location icon that represents place, a heart to symbolize love, and a letter "A" to stand for the company's name. In April 2015, following the Obama administration's easing of restrictions on U.S. businesses to operate in Cuba, Airbnb expanded to Cuba, making it one of the first U.S. companies to do so.In the summer of 2016, at the request of three members of the United States Senate, the Federal Trade Commission began investigating how Airbnb affected housing costs. In October 2016, New York Governor Andrew Cuomo signed a bill charging Airbnb fines for violations of local housing laws. The New York Times reported that these events were related and part of a "plan that the hotel association started in early 2016 to thwart Airbnb".
In January 2017, Airbnb led a $13 million investment in restaurant reservation-booking app, Resy, along with serial entrepreneurs Gary Vaynerchuk, Ben Leventhal and Mike Montero.
Airbnb first became profitable during the second half of 2016. Airbnb's revenue grew more than 80% from 2015 to 2016. After a $200 million profit in 2018, Airbnb posted a loss of $322 million in 2019.
In February 2018, the company announced Airbnb Plus, a collection of homes that have been vetted for quality of services, comfort and design, as well as Beyond by Airbnb, which offers luxury vacation rentals. By October 2019, two million people were staying with Airbnb each night.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, Airbnb suffered a significant drop in bookings, estimated at between 41% and 96%. In response, the company lowered its internal valuation from $31 billion to $26 billion, and considered delaying plans for an IPO. On March 30, CEO and Head of Community Brian Chesky penned a letter to hosts, pledging $250 million for widespread guest cancellations.
On May 5, 2020, Brian Chesky sent a memo to all employees announcing the company would be laying off approximately 1,900 employees, or about 25% of its workforce in the Americas, Europe, and Asia due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
On August 19, 2020, the company announced that it had filed for an IPO. In November 2020, the company announced that it had officially filed for an IPO and that it was set to go public in December. On December 10, 2020, the company went public with a valuation of over $100 billion making it one of the largest IPOs of 2020. This market capital is more than the three biggest publicly traded hotels chains (Marriott, Hilton, and Intercontinental) combined. Though some are calling overvaluation, the company lacks traditional mortgages, employee fees, and maintenance fees that burden hotels. Airbnb hosts pay their own mortgage and clean their apartments, leaving the company much more free of debt, making it far more valuable.
