Yahoo Finance Airbnb Names CFO to New Chief Business Officer Role in Shake-Up
(Bloomberg) -- Airbnb Inc. elevated Chief Financial Officer Dave Stephenson to a new role overseeing its business strategy, including the home-sharing company’s overseas expansion.
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Stephenson, who has been the company’s finance head since 2019, will be Airbnb’s first chief business officer, the company said in a statement Tuesday. Ellie Mertz, a finance executive who has been at the company 11 years, will take over as CFO.
The new structure will put Airbnb’s global business operations under Stephenson, an Amazon.com Inc. veteran who previously served as CFO of that company’s worldwide consumer business before being hired by Airbnb to bring the company public. The regional leaders of the Americas, Asia-Pacific and Europe business units will report to him in the new job, which he’ll start on Jan. 2.
The company is looking to “turn a corner” after refining its core business in the past year, Chief Executive Officer Brian Chesky said in the statement. “We’re about to embark on our next chapter as a company,” he said. “Airbnb is at an inflection point.”
Read More: Airbnb to Surface ‘Guest Favorite’ Homes in Quality Push
Airbnb has bounced back from a pandemic-era slowdown but is still contending with a volatile industry. The post-pandemic travel boom has started to normalize, and last month the company gave a disappointing outlook for the fourth quarter, spurring concerns of tighter consumer spending.
The San Francisco-based company has had to adapt to new regulations especially in high-volume cities like New York, increased competition from hotels, and a transition to bookings of long-term stays of 28 days or more from short-term rentals.
Chesky has spent the past few months hinting at what’s to come for the company’s new ventures, which he said would include further integrations of artificial intelligence and third-party services into its products. Last month, it made its first acquisition as a public company when it bought a 12-person AI startup led by Adam Cheyer and Siamak Hodjat, the former Apple Inc. leaders behind the voice assistant Siri.
Read More: Short-Term Rentals That Airbnb Turned Into a Rage Are Struggling
As part of Airbnb’s executive shuffle, Global Head of Hosting Catherine Powell will transition to an advisory role before leaving the company next year. She was hired in early 2020 to lead Airbnb’s Experiences business, but her role shifted to become a liaison between hosts and the company as Airbnb adapted to the Covid-19 pandemic and trimmed its operations.
“She and I spent a lot of time talking about the transition, and this decision wasn’t made lightly,” Chesky said.
Powell’s duties will be split up among other executives. Global Head of Marketing Hiroki Asai will oversee the liaison work that’s handled by the host community team, led by Marcela Aguilar. All other hosting-related teams previously under Powell will report to Stephenson.
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