So every time a startup signs a lease for office space we have to read about it on front-page HN? Who cares? This isn't even interesting. As for the "commitment," a lease is simply an asset and can be sold like anything else.
Airbnb Commits To SF By Signing A 10-Year, 169,000 Square Foot Lease
31–40 of 41 posts
Re: Airbnb Commits To SF By Signing A 10-Year, 169,000 Square Foot Lease
#32Earlier quoted context omitted.
I don't think that's a global rule- look at Instagram (nothing to do with the sale, just the number of users served by a company with two employees). Obviously, AirBnb is a very different business, but it is possible to grow by orders of magnitude without also growing headcount.
It's about revenue, not user count. Money changes everything: when customers pay, they expect a different level of service. A company's revenue per employee is a common benchmark, and is usually around $600K-$1MM or so for successful companies at or near scale, up to $2.2MM for outliers like Apple(1). A company cannot grow to $100MM revenue and higher without having a large number of employees just to manage those re…
A different level of service means customer support, it doesn't mean 10x-100x the number of developers working on the product.
So honestly, I'm curious---what is AirBnB going to do with ~1000 developers. Facebook expanded their headcount and created a whole suite of products glomped onto their original vision. I'd like to know if AirBnB intends the same and if so what are their plans.
Ofcourse, they have no obligation to blab about them early.
Re: Airbnb Commits To SF By Signing A 10-Year, 169,000 Square Foot Lease
#33For any other europeans, 169,000 sq ft = 15 700 m^2 (or slightly bigger than two football pitches joined up). I don't know enough about retail space to say if this is ambitious or not? On the one hand, a ten year lease is a big commitment, on the other hand I guess AirBnB is thinking 'go big or go home', and in that case it might well get cramped sooner than that.
Thank you. I was wondering why they were renting such a massive amount of space for a moment there.
Re: Airbnb Commits To SF By Signing A 10-Year, 169,000 Square Foot Lease
#34Earlier quoted context omitted.
We originally wanted to work in our apartment forever. We figured we could fit 100 people in 5 apartment units in our building. Assuming we would need to scale beyond that, Joe and I talked about renting every home on the street. Imagine product in one house, marketing in another... Wasn't really feasible though.
That sounds amazing an scary at the same time. Wonder if you could try it out for a new product team, that's fairly isolated from rest of the company. A startup within AirBnb?
"airbnb skunkworks? Yeah, they're three houses down"
Re: Airbnb Commits To SF By Signing A 10-Year, 169,000 Square Foot Lease
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
Maybe they plan to divide it into smaller chunks and loan them out to people via some kind of internet website for that sort of thing?
I'm actually wondering if they will ever get into the coworking space.
I think 42Floors is going to get there first:
Re: Airbnb Commits To SF By Signing A 10-Year, 169,000 Square Foot Lease
#36888 Brannan does not look anything like the pristine building pictured in the article. Why would they need to post a clearly 'shopped picture of a building that already exists unless they were hiding something? The actual building's windows are all painted over and that tree in the foreground does not exist. The freeway overpass pictured just across the street is a homeless encampment strewn with shopping carts, huma…
Presumably they'll be renovating and this is planning artwork from their architect. This is the equivalent of my sending my family concept sketches of my kitchen renovation. I can't imagine what they'd be "hiding". Edit: this seems to be pretty close to the angle in the picture: http://g.co/maps/xj758
Speaking from having met someone on the renovation project, That is indeed artwork from the architect, The building itself quite nice, but it's gone a bit to shit recently, the renovation is supposed to be rather impressive.
Re: Airbnb Commits To SF By Signing A 10-Year, 169,000 Square Foot Lease
#37888 Brannan does not look anything like the pristine building pictured in the article. Why would they need to post a clearly 'shopped picture of a building that already exists unless they were hiding something? The actual building's windows are all painted over and that tree in the foreground does not exist. The freeway overpass pictured just across the street is a homeless encampment strewn with shopping carts, huma…
Presumably they'll be renovating and this is planning artwork from their architect. This is the equivalent of my sending my family concept sketches of my kitchen renovation. I can't imagine what they'd be "hiding". Edit: this seems to be pretty close to the angle in the picture: http://g.co/maps/xj758
"and this is planning artwork from their architect"
Good point but this appears to be the architect and the drawings on the website look nothing like the rendering that made the curbed story:
http://www.menaarchitects.com/portfolio/002_mixed_office_com...
Re: Airbnb Commits To SF By Signing A 10-Year, 169,000 Square Foot Lease
#38888 Brannan does not look anything like the pristine building pictured in the article. Why would they need to post a clearly 'shopped picture of a building that already exists unless they were hiding something? The actual building's windows are all painted over and that tree in the foreground does not exist. The freeway overpass pictured just across the street is a homeless encampment strewn with shopping carts, huma…
"Airbnb has partnered up with the world-famous Gensler Architects (same folks who renovated Terminal 2) to design the space. The building is also going to seek LEED Silver certification" Obviously, the picture is what the building will look like after renovations are done.
"the picture is what the building will look like after renovations are done."
Gensler is doing the interior for Airbnb. This is who is doing the building exterior:
http://www.menaarchitects.com/portfolio/002_mixed_office_com...
Re: Airbnb Commits To SF By Signing A 10-Year, 169,000 Square Foot Lease
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
And have their employees work out of Starbucks?
We originally wanted to work in our apartment forever. We figured we could fit 100 people in 5 apartment units in our building. Assuming we would need to scale beyond that, Joe and I talked about renting every home on the street. Imagine product in one house, marketing in another... Wasn't really feasible though.
"Wasn't really feasible though"
Zoning as only one issue. You most definitely can't run a business in a residential apartment, condo, coop or neighborhood. In some neighborhoods you might slide by depending on the makeup and the neighbors.
Re: Airbnb Commits To SF By Signing A 10-Year, 169,000 Square Foot Lease
#40Earlier quoted context omitted.
To get big, you have to grow your headcount. Staying lean forever will not support the kind of growth that AirBnB is currently enjoying or would like to achieve. The "lean" mentality is fine when you're searching for a business model or want to run a lifestyle business. It's suicide if you want to build a large company to service a large customer base. And there's nothing wrong with wanting to grow big. In fact, it's…
I don't think that's a global rule- look at Instagram (nothing to do with the sale, just the number of users served by a company with two employees). Obviously, AirBnb is a very different business, but it is possible to grow by orders of magnitude without also growing headcount.
Instagram has a few moving parts (and no revenue). AirBnB has millions (and millions in revenue).