Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio news LL Right, welcome back,
Speaker 1: Airbnb hosting a summer release today. Let's get right out
Speaker 1: to San Francisco right now, we're Bloomberg Tech co hosts
Speaker 1: is standing by with the CEO and co founder of Airbnb,
Speaker 1: Brian Cheski. Take it away.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Brian, it's good to have you with us. Like,
Speaker 2: look the way that I look at this new offering
Speaker 2: from Airbnb, not just an expansion of travel services right.
Speaker 2: More like Airbnb is an app store where developers can
Speaker 2: build for the existing customer base. So with everything new
Speaker 2: that you're offering, is this Brian Chesky and founder mode
Speaker 2: building it to grow it and launch it or are
Speaker 2: you thinking M and A and buying it?
Speaker 3: Interesting? Great question, So you know, I think you're right.
Speaker 3: What we announced today were four major services groceries, airport pickup,
Speaker 3: luggage storage, and car Rentalds. But I told everyone is
Speaker 3: just the beginning. You're going to see and more services.
Speaker 3: And what we're building is an ecosystem of services for
Speaker 3: every part of your trip, from the time you arrive
Speaker 3: at the time you leave. It is a little bit
Speaker 3: like an app store in the sense that we' working
Speaker 3: with the developers. We want to create really great integrations,
Speaker 3: we want to create great guidelines, and mostly the answer
Speaker 3: your question, we're looking mostly at partnering. We're always going
Speaker 3: to be open minded about acquisitions, but you know, we
Speaker 3: really want to elevate these partners around the world, and
Speaker 3: so we have some great partners today and we really
Speaker 3: just want to be a great partner to them.
Speaker 2: The reason I asked it that way, Brian, is like,
Speaker 2: strategically in the past, you've done some deals. I'm thinking
Speaker 2: about hotels tonight or like even areas you've divested from.
Speaker 2: What am I thinking of, like tickets, tourbooking, right, But
Speaker 2: hotels is really interesting here twenty markets for boutique hotels.
Speaker 2: I would look at that and say those are also
Speaker 2: markets where there are some limitations on short term rental.
Speaker 2: But what's your pitch to the boutique hotel industry why
Speaker 2: Airbnb is a partner?
Speaker 3: Well, actually, it's really interesting they're pitching us, which I
Speaker 3: was very surprised. And why are they pitching us? Well,
Speaker 3: because many of the batique and independent hotels. By the way,
Speaker 3: if anyone's wondering how many, there are about sixty percent
Speaker 3: of the hotels in the world in butiques and independence.
Speaker 3: Batiques and independents don't get the same deal that chan hotels
Speaker 3: get because chain hotels like Hilton and Maria have points programs.
Speaker 3: They also are able to negotiate with book and Expedia
Speaker 3: lower commissions than batiques, and so what we offer is
Speaker 3: a flat fifteen percent commission on batiques and hotels. We've
Speaker 3: got this great merchandising for them. A lot of batique hotels,
Speaker 3: especially in Europe, love that we have American travelers, we
Speaker 3: have younger travelers, and we're just really built custom for them,
Speaker 3: and so they ultimately want more demand of young and
Speaker 3: young travelers in particular, and that's we can offer them.
Speaker 2: Changing consumer behavior so hard, or rather bringing new behaviors
Speaker 2: from a consumer so hard. Like I'm going to pass
Speaker 2: a roeblaz right in June. So if I book an Airbnb, okay,
Speaker 2: maybe it makes sense if I do the wine tasting
Speaker 2: experience with it. But with all the new things you have,
Speaker 2: how do you actually get people to make use of that?
Speaker 3: You know, it's really important that we personalize the app.
Speaker 3: So like some people want to participate and do a
Speaker 3: cooking class, to do a food tour in their vacation.
Speaker 3: Some people just want to relax and they want groceries
Speaker 3: to deliver for them, and they want everything taken care of.
Speaker 3: The most important thing is that we have a deeply
Speaker 3: personalized service. So with a new homepage, the app really
Speaker 3: learns about you. With AI, we can start to understand
Speaker 3: your preferences. My vision is eventually every person in the
Speaker 3: open Airbnb sees something different than something else based on
Speaker 3: what they love, and I, over time want the app
Speaker 3: to feel like it knows you. You know, we're in
Speaker 3: the hospitality business. Our app is only as good as
Speaker 3: the sense that it feels like it knows you and
Speaker 3: it's personalized to you. So even if one day we
Speaker 3: offer one hundred different categories service experiences, we don't want
Speaker 3: to throw a hundred things at you. We want to
Speaker 3: know the five things you really care about.
Speaker 2: Since the beginning of May, I've been reading completely inconsistent
Speaker 2: reports about travel demand for the World FIFA World Cup,
Speaker 2: particularly from the hotels. What is Airbnb seeing for those
Speaker 2: coming for this World Cup?
Speaker 3: I mean, we are anticipating the World Cup will be
Speaker 3: the biggest event in Airbnb history, and we're seeing a
Speaker 3: similar travel pattern as the Milan Olympics more than sixty
Speaker 3: days out for the Milan Olympics, it did not look
Speaker 3: like the demand was going to be what we anticipated,
Speaker 3: and then something unexpected happened. We had a surge of
Speaker 3: demand within sixty days of the beginning of the games,
Speaker 3: and two hundred thousand guests stayed in Milan and Quartino
Speaker 3: for the Olympics. So what we're seeing is people booking
Speaker 3: more last minute. But we are still seeing a huge
Speaker 3: amount of demand for the World Cup. So to answer question,
Speaker 3: we are expecting it to be the biggest event in
Speaker 3: airbingb history.
Speaker 2: You spoke to my colleague and friend Natalie learn about
Speaker 2: Chinese AI models and a misunderstanding of how that works
Speaker 2: in practice. But I just wanted to clarify. Is Airbnb
Speaker 2: still using or relying on some of those models you
Speaker 2: know Quinn or even new ones, and is that the
Speaker 2: open source opportunity or is that the sort of cloud
Speaker 2: based API where you're a customer of those companies.
Speaker 3: We are not a customer of those companies. We're using
Speaker 3: a variety of different open source models. I just want
Speaker 3: to say a few things about this matter. Number One,
Speaker 3: data and privacy is most important to Airbnb. I think
Speaker 3: anyone who knows knows we have an outstanding track record
Speaker 3: on data security and privacy. Number two, all of our
Speaker 3: data is vaulted. No company has access to our data.
Speaker 3: It is vaulted in Airbnb. Number three, The Congressional Committee
Speaker 3: has reached out to us. They said they have some questions.
Speaker 3: We said, we want to cooperate, and so we're in
Speaker 3: direct contact and cooperation with them. And I think before
Speaker 3: I answer any more questions to the public, I want
Speaker 3: to make sure that the Congressional Committee. Here's from me directly.
Speaker 2: Brian Chesky, Airbnb co founder and CEO expanding bag storage
Speaker 2: car rentals, Bootique hotels. But I love talking to you
Speaker 2: about technology as well. Thank you, Thank you very much,