Airbnb acquires Gaest.com for booking offsite meetings
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Airbnb on Friday announced it's acquiring Gaest.com, a Danish firm that connects businesses with spaces they can rent for offsite meetings. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. The purchase will help Airbnb accelerate the expansion of its enterprise business..
Airbnb already accommodates business travelers on its platform with Airbnb for Work. As of September, 700,000 companies have had employees sign up and book with Airbnb for Work. However, according to Airbnb's own estimates, only 25 percent of employees within a company travel for work. So in September it announced an expansion of Airbnb for Work.
"Now, the team focuses on bringing the best of Airbnb to the professional world by expanding beyond just business travel and including team building, offsites and meetings, and relocations for customers," the company explained in a blog post Friday.
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"We imagine a world where anyone can share their space for professional events and, in the longer term, for celebrations," David Holyoke, Global Head of Airbnb for Work, said in a statement. "Bringing in a leadership team with strong domain knowledge allows us to accelerate our work in this area, and more importantly Gaest.com and Airbnb share a vision of helping every space owner become entrepreneurs through sharing their spaces with those who need it."
Gaest.com, which was founded in 2015 in Aarhus, Denmark, now operates across six continents. Guests book spaces on Gaest.com for interviews, meetings, workshops, team building events, and even photoshoots. The platform lets hosts list their spaces and gives them the option of providing add-ons and other services to enrich the stay.
Gaest.com will continue to operate as its own platform for the foreseeable future, Airbnb said, and Gaest.com team members will join Airbnb. The Gaest.com team will report to Airbnb's Homes business unit.