Tripadvisor names media exec Matt Goldberg as CEO beginning July 1

Matt Goldberg, a veteran media executive who served as CEO of Lonely Planet from 2009 to 2013, will become CEO of Tripadvisor beginning July 1, succeeding co-founder Steve Kaufer who announced in November he would step down .

“We are excited to announce the appointment of Matt Goldberg to the role of CEO,” says Greg Maffei, chairman of the board at Tripadvisor.

“Matt has proven leadership and experience in strategy and operations for more than 20 years across a number of leading media, advertising, and consumer-facing companies. We welcome him to the team and look forward to his expertise as he leads Tripadvisor in the next phase of its journey.”

Goldberg most recently was executive vice president, North America and global operations at media buying platform The Trade Desk. Prior to that he has held executive roles at News Corp and Liberty Media Corporation’s QVC Group - Tripadvisor chairman Maffei is president and CEO of Liberty Media Corporation. Goldberg is also founding director of Dataphilanthropy, a non-profit focused on building programs to apply data to better address and understand economic disparity.

The announcement of Goldberg as CEO comes in tandem with the company’s Q1 financial results.

In a call Thursday morning with analysts to discuss those results, Kaufer says Goldberg’s broad experience gives him valuable perspective.

“You can imagine we talked to a number of very accomplished individuals that had risen to do very well in their respective departments at some very big companies, but I felt Matt's ability to see the whole picture was actually more valuable than a star player and a player that had either just done sales or just done products,” Kaufer says.

“So again, there are lots of different ways to craft what a CEO is going to be great at, but I like the breadth.” And he adds that “Tripadvisor isn’t a startup anymore... we have a huge TAM in front of us, huge number of assets,” and he expects Goldberg to be able to reshape the company for the future, much as he did at Lonely Planet.

“I could not be more enthusiastic about joining Tripadvisor, a company I have long admired, whose leadership and teams have built an amazing, globally recognized consumer brand with a unique spot in travel and digital media,” Goldberg says.

“I’m incredibly excited to return to the travel sector to innovate within the industry and leverage the platform’s reach and community trust. I see a long runway ahead and many opportunities to create value for our travelers and partners.”

Kaufer co-founded Tripadvisor in 2000 and in November announced his intention to leave his role as CEO.

First quarter financial results

In a letter to shareholders regarding the Q1 results, Kaufer says, “We are very pleased with our performance in Q1 2022, which exceeded our expectations, and start the year well-positioned to capture demand as leisure travel continues to recover and as we continue to strengthen our offerings across segments. Relative to our outlook in mid-February, we exceeded our expectations for Q1 2022, driven by strong performance in our Experiences and Dining segment supported by steady recovery in our hotels and display and platform revenue streams.”

Tripadvisor revenue in Q1 was $262 million, more than double the revenue in the same period a year earlier and 70% of the same period in 2019.

Adjusted EBITDA in Q1 came in at $27 million, up from a loss of $26 million in Q1 2021.

During the first quarter Tripadvisor’s average monthly unique users on its branded websites increased 27% year-over-year and was about 71% of the comparable period in 2019.

Selling and marketing costs in the first quarter was $141 million, an increased of 93% year-over-year, which the company says is primarily due to “an increase in our SEM and other online traffic acquisition spend in response to increased consumer travel demand...”

*This story will be updated following Tripadvisor's call with financial analysts Thursday morning.