Airbnb Inc. has hired another executive from Amazon.com Inc., this time naming Dave Stephenson as chief financial officer of the vacation-rental portal ahead of a potential initial public offering.
Mr.
Stephenson will join the San Francisco-based company in early January,
according to a company
blog post, and will report to Airbnb Chief Executive Brian Chesky. He
joins Airbnb after 17 years at Amazon, where he was most recently vice
president and finance chief of the company’s world-wide consumer organization
and responsible for Amazon’s global web sales.
Before that, he was vice
president for Amazon’s international consumer business and oversaw the finances
of various business units, including the North American retail operation,
merchant services and Amazon Web Services.
Mr. Stephenson left Amazon for a brief
stint to work as president and CFO of Big Fish Games Inc., a maker of computer
and smartphone games, and served for nearly a decade at Procter
& Gamble Co. on various finance and engineering roles, Airbnb
said.
“Dave is one
of the best financial operators in the world and there’s no one better prepared
to serve as our CFO,” Mr. Chesky said in the blog post. “In the years ahead,
Dave will be Airbnb’s quarterback for long-term growth, driving us to be even
more efficient and leverage what makes Airbnb unique to create new businesses
and continue to expand.”
Mr. Chesky
has said Airbnb is preparing for an IPO in 2019, but the timing is uncertain.
Airbnb was valued by investors at
$31 billion as of a capital raise in March 2017.
In
September, the company had requested the U.S. Securities and Exchange
Commission change
its rules that could potentially allow the home-sharing platform to
give hosts stock in the company.
Mr.
Stephenson will succeed Laurence Tosi, who
stepped down from Airbnb in February to focus on his investment fund.
“I am
thrilled to be joining and bringing my experience leading fast-growing
businesses at scale to help Airbnb accelerate its already incredible growth,”
Mr. Stephenson said in the blog post.
Airbnb
earlier this year hired
another executive from Amazon, Greg Greeley, who became president
of its homes unit.
Compensation
details for Mr. Stephenson weren’t immediately available. Airbnb didn’t
immediately respond to a request for additional comment. Amazon declined to
comment.
Corrections & Amplifications
Greg Greeley is the president of Airbnb’s homes unit. An earlier version of
this article incorrectly named him Mr. Geeley. (Nov. 26)
Source: wsj.com