Airbnb poaches Amazon exec as its new CFO as the $31 billion startup preps for IPO
- Airbnb, which is poised to go public in the second half of 2019, has a new chief financial officer.
- Dave Stephenson joined Airbnb after 17 years at Amazon.
- He replaces Laurence Tosi, who left the CFO role in February after reportedly disagreeing with CEO Brian Chesky over the future of the company.
Airbnb has a new chief financial officer, the company announced Monday.
Dave Stephenson, whose spent the last 17 years at Amazon, joins the startup more than nine months after Laurence Tosi left the position vacant. Stephenson was poached from his role as vice president and CFO of Amazon's worldwide consumer organization, where he managed all of Amazon's global online sales, from Amazon Prime to Whole Foods.
Airbnb, which was last valued at $31 billion in a funding round led by Alphabet's CapitalG in September 2017, is preparing for an initial public offering. CEO Brian Chesky previously said that the company will be ready to go public by June 30, 2019.
Stephenson's "extensive experience building and scaling rapidly growing businesses" will be especially valuable to Airbnb, said Ann Mather, the newly-appointed audit chair on Airbnb's Board of Directors, in a statement.
The last CFO, Tosi, was an early investor in Airbnb. He joined the company in 2015 and left in early 2018.
The Information reported at the time that Tosi left over disagreements over " "how to balance the financial stability needed to go public with Mr. Chesky's desire to transform Airbnb into a more diversified travel firm, investing in areas that might not yield profits for awhile."