Live data from Hacker News

Citing revenue declines, Airbnb cuts 25% of workforce

techcrunch.com

61–70 of 936 posts

Re: Citing revenue declines, Airbnb cuts 25% of workforce

#61
post #21

Does anyone know what percentage of the call centers are not actual employees but contractors? The contractors are usually demand based, therefore "invisible" in these stats.

A lot of tech companies have relied on BPO (business process outsourcing) like TaskUs for call center workers.

They try to take on fresh college graduates as employees in the Philippines for about $400/salary + benefits and try to resell them to companies as outsourced talent for about $1800/month.

Re: Citing revenue declines, Airbnb cuts 25% of workforce

#62
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m surprised they were still handing out options - don’t most later stage startups switch to RSUs? I’d hate to have to decide whether to exercise today, cliff or no cliff.

I thought RSUs are only given by public companies. Anyway, they would be crazy not to exercise.

Hopefully they have cash to cover the exercise and the taxes!

Tough choice to make right when you just lost your job. The tax bill could be tens of thousands of dollars or more.

Re: Citing revenue declines, Airbnb cuts 25% of workforce

#63
I wonder how will the revenue drop be distributed globally. which countries, places will see the worst revenue drops. In such places there will be highest probability than some Airbnb landlords start selling off their properties - can be a good time for people who want to buy a place for themselves!

Re: Citing revenue declines, Airbnb cuts 25% of workforce

#64
post #30
post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah that's generous by most standards.

By most American standards

"In many countries, the severance pay is a lump sum that increases with the employee’s tenure in the company and their wage level. In the Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Italy, Lithuania, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia and Spain, employees with service of up to one year are entitled to severance pay (in most cases one month’s pay), while in Luxembourg employees have to have a minimum of five years within the organisation before receiving severance pay.

In France and Slovenia, employees with up to five years’ tenure are entitled to severance pay amounting to a maximum of one month’s pay; in Spain, the entitlement is 100 days’ pay for the same tenure."

AirBnB is giving laid off workers around 3 months of severance pay. How is that less competitive than what's given in Europe?

Re: Citing revenue declines, Airbnb cuts 25% of workforce

#65
post #44

Separated employees will receive 14 weeks of pay, and one more week for each year served at the company (rounding partial years up). The firm is also dropping its one-year equity cliff so that employees who are laid off with under 12 months of tenure can buy their vested options; Airbnb will also provide 12 months of health insurance through COBRA in the United States, and health care coverage through 2020 in the res…

That's why when a yet another aspiring startup wants to hire me, I ask for a high sign on bonus as an insurance, monthly vesting cycle, at least 200k in base pay and high severance upon termination. Never been given that, but I don't regret: looking back, all those "just 1 year till IPO" companies are underwater.

Most startups are an unintentional scam by unwitting founders.

Re: Citing revenue declines, Airbnb cuts 25% of workforce

#66
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m surprised they were still handing out options - don’t most later stage startups switch to RSUs? I’d hate to have to decide whether to exercise today, cliff or no cliff.

I thought RSUs are only given by public companies. Anyway, they would be crazy not to exercise.

Some private companies offer RSU grants. I've been offered them.

Re: Citing revenue declines, Airbnb cuts 25% of workforce

#67
post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m surprised they were still handing out options - don’t most later stage startups switch to RSUs? I’d hate to have to decide whether to exercise today, cliff or no cliff.

Why would you not want optionality? Optionality always has carries an intrinsic positive value.

If you started working at Boeing exactly a year ago and were leaving today, would you rather have been granted RSUs at a notional initial value of $371.60/sh or been granted options at a strike price of $371.60/sh?

Re: Citing revenue declines, Airbnb cuts 25% of workforce

#68

I'm shocked that 2020 revenues will come in only 50% below 2019. I don't think anyone will be travelling for the bulk of this year, especially with the looming threat of potentially getting sick in a foreign country or away from your home. It will take 5+ years for them to get back the same level of inventory/hosts/customers as they had in 2019. Many hosts will foreclose on their rented properties during 2020 or conv…

> I'm shocked that 2020 revenues will come in only 50% below 2019

This is a fair point, but it also suggests strongly that a significant minority of their business is month to month rentals, possibly in place of leasing.

And hey, being frank, I wouldn't mind considering going somewhere else for a few months now that I can work remotely for a while.

Re: Citing revenue declines, Airbnb cuts 25% of workforce

#69

I'm shocked that 2020 revenues will come in only 50% below 2019. I don't think anyone will be travelling for the bulk of this year, especially with the looming threat of potentially getting sick in a foreign country or away from your home. It will take 5+ years for them to get back the same level of inventory/hosts/customers as they had in 2019. Many hosts will foreclose on their rented properties during 2020 or conv…

I mean it’s just a forecast. I don’t think it will bounce back as quickly as they are forecasting, though.

Re: Citing revenue declines, Airbnb cuts 25% of workforce

#70

Separated employees will receive 14 weeks of pay, and one more week for each year served at the company (rounding partial years up). The firm is also dropping its one-year equity cliff so that employees who are laid off with under 12 months of tenure can buy their vested options; Airbnb will also provide 12 months of health insurance through COBRA in the United States, and health care coverage through 2020 in the res…

Dropping the cliff period for new employees is pretty much useless. The equity/ESOPs new employees will be exercising will be of the last valuation price which would be already high, and after Covid-19, with the struggles of tourism industry as such the notional value would have fallen a lot. So if you exercise those significantly expensive options now, you would probably need to hold it for a long time and really believe that AirBnB can be where it was.
Post reply on HN