The sharing economy continues its upswing with Asia showing a large growth potential
Some of my friends say that I live an Airbnb life. Yes, I host people in California and Mexico, and I have been a guest myself in London and Athens.
Perhaps you've heard of the Airbnb story.
The year of 2007 was the pivotal moment of the now Airbnb revolution. It was during a large design convention in San Francisco, which left the city’s hotel rooms nearly sold out, that Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia formed Airbnb. Living in one of the most expensive cities on the planet and barely scraping by each month to pay their rent, the two forward thinkers asked themselves, “Why not rent out our extra room and advertise it on the conference website?” The struggling flat mates rented out three airbeds on the floor, making a quick and easy buck.
From the simple idea of charging convention attendees for room and board, Brian Chesky and Joe Gebbia would change the world of peer-to-peer travel forever.
The third co-founder of Airbnb Nathan Blecharczyk started coding at the age of 12 and launched an online marketing business while in high school with clients in over 20 countries.
The entrepreneur Blecharczyk's earnings of nearly $800,000.00 helped to pay his way through Harvard University where he studied computer science.
The success of Airbnb is the driving factor of the sharing economy. The company has come a long way since 2008. With a $30 billion valuation, there seems to be no end in sight.
As the company skyrockets to unprecedented new heights, a greater emphasis on bolstering the Asia-Pacific sector, surely the future is bright for the San Francisco based sharing economy giant.
Specifically, China has tremendous room for growth. As the Chinese market continues to discover the sharing economy, numbers will accelerate for Airbnb.
Over 130 million Chinese nationals are now traveling the world. “It’s a huge population, and so much of that population is becoming middle class. The first thing people want to do when they have discretionary income is travel. So, I think we’d be at a huge loss if we weren’t popular in Asia, but huge everywhere else," said Blecharczyk.
While the short-term online rental platform Tujia.com is at the forefront in China at 400,000 listings; Airbnb does have a strong foothold of close to 100,000 listings in the humongous population over one billion inhabitants.
Iconic tourist cities such as New York, Barcelona, Venice, and even its home town of San Francisco are claiming that the house sharing platforms the likes of Airbnb and HomeAway are disruptive and drive up rents and reducing the local housing market.
New markets will prevail. Look for Airbnb to grab a larger slice in not only China but it the region as a whole.