Airbnb, Quora, and Uber Will Shake Things Up At Disrupt NYC

At Disrupt NYC, we’re all about startups. We’ve culled two dozen of the hottest startups from over 500 applicants to launch at the event (which starts May 23, get tickets here). We are also bringing startups well on their way to disrupting existing markets onstage to share their experiences.

Two sessions I am particularly excited about will bring the founders of Airbnb, Uber, and Quora to Disrupt NYC. Quora founder Charlie Cheever will be interviewed by Hunch founder Chris Dixon in a live session of his TCTV show Founder Stories. Quora, which was founded by Facebook expats Cheever and Adam D’Angelo, takes a unique social approach to Q&A and general knowledge discovery. Cheever will talk about their approach to designing their product, fostering a community that can provide the best answers on the Web, and how Quora plans to expand to new areas of knowledge and expertise.

In another session, Airbnb CEO Brian Chesky and Uber CEO Travis Kalanick will tell us how they are disrupting offline businesses. Airbnb is killing it by turning people’s homes and apartments—and even villages and castles—into vacation rentals. It’s the peer-to-peer economy in action. Uber, meanwhile, is bringing data to personal transportation by rethinking black car dispatch services for the age of the iPhone. Uber just officially launched in New York City too. If any industry could use some disruption, it is the taxi and livery industry.

You can see the entire Disrupt agenda here.

Charlie Cheever
Co-founder, Quora

Charlie Cheever is the co-founder of Quora, formerly Alma Networks. Before founding Quora Charlie worked as an engineer and manager at Facebook, where he oversaw the creation of Facebook Connect and the Facebook Platform.

Prior to joining Facebook, Charlie served as a Software Development Engineer at Amazon. Charlie graduated from Harvard College with an A.B. in Computer Science.

Travis Kalanick
Co-founder and CEO, Uber

Travis Kalanick is a successful entrepreneur in the areas of consumer Internet, p2p, and enterprise content delivery. His most recent company, Red Swoosh, was sold for $19M to Akamai Technologies in April 2007 after receiving $1.7M in funding from August Capital, Mark Cuban, and Crosslink Capital. Prior companies include Scour, the world’s first p2p search engine where Kalanick also attained the dubious distinction of having been sued for $250 billion. Today Kalanick invests in and advises kick-ass startups founded by truly awesome entrepreneurs – while he recharges before his next gig.

Brian Chesky
Co-founder and CEO, Airbnb

Brian is co-founder and CEO of Airbnb. His primary responsibility is driving the company vision and assembling a passionate team to realize that vision. Brian is a designer and entrepreneur who likes to disrupt the marketplace with ideas that change the way people live. Before Airbnb, Brian ran an industrial design shop in Los Angeles. Brian holds a BFA in industrial design from the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD).