Airbnb expands its business as a travel agency

In what it describes as "the most important evolution in its eight years of existence", the platform announces the launch of 'Trips', a new application that offers services such as "experiences" and "places"

   Airbnb wants to go beyond its usual business with hotels and aims to expand its influence to all the activities of its users during their trips, with new features disclosed this Thursday.

"The ultimate vision of Airbnb is to satisfy all aspects of a trip" of the users, the online platform has pointed out in a statement.

   In what it describes as "the most important evolution in its eight years of existence", Airbnb announces the launch of 'Trips', a new application that offers services baptized as "experiences" and "places".

The first allows you to book activities proposed by "local experts" presented by Airbnb, for example, go hunting for truffles in Tuscany or driving legendary vehicles in Miami.

The platform announces 500 possible "experiences" in cities such as Paris, London, Florence, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Miami, Havana, Nairobi, Tokyo or Seoul.

The hosts of some 50 cities around the world will be able to propose activities that they organize in the list of "experiences".

"Having transformed the place where people stay when they travel, through the hospitality of the people," Airbnb wants to use this approach "for the rest of the trip and, in this way, to give a way for people to do money thanks to their passions and interests, "the company said.

In the menu of "places" there is a kind of interactive travel guide, with recommendations from local residents about bars, restaurants, parks, cafes or the best itinerary for a walk.

Airbnb has also announced an alliance with Resy, a service for restaurant reservations, and with Detour, which offers audios for walking tours in some cities.

In the long term, the online platform plans to add supplementary menus to book flights.

In addition to diversifying its services, Airbnb has announced a new mechanism to authenticate the identity of its users. The organizers and participants of the "experiences" should take a selfie and scan their identification. This procedure is also being tested for hosting services.

Airbnb, headquartered in San Francisco, is next to the transport multinational Uber leader of the "shared economies", but its growth is framed in the controversy, mainly by an inequality in the conditions of competition with local companies that offer the same services .