Airbnb Just Purchased AdBasis. Why Does Airbnb Need Ad Tech?

Today, Airbnb just purchased ad tech firm AdBasis for an undisclosed amount. AdBasis describes itself as a "controlled testing environment and analytics tool for companies to conduct A/B and multivariate tests on search, display and mobile ads. 

Basically, when an Atlanta Ad Agency is working on a campaign and wants to test different offers or creative execution, we use AdBasis or one of their competitors to give us a true, unbiased look as to how changes to content, bidding and targeting will impact performance. This creates a road map for future campaigns.

With the Airbnb purchase, AdBasis will stop working with current customers and agencies by mid-February 2018. Currently the company works with Safeway, Angie's List and ad agencies such as 3Q Digital and iProspect.

Since Airbnb does not have any advertising on it's platform, why did they purchase an ad tech company? Driven by clicks, Airbnb has been working to maximize the impact from it's current campaigns including how it works with affiliates. As a site that represents others, it's important to maximize the listings of hosts and hold off any new competition.

Airbnb has not said anything about acquiring additional ad tech companies. This purchase is a confirmation that they are continuing to look at the dollars they spend to bring more people to their site. Airbnb is built on the premise that it's smarter to rent than to buy. In this
case they elected to buy AdBasis when they could been a client and used same technology and possibly more focused R&D.  This could be a sign of a new trend in ad tech.  Why rent when you can own?