Associate Counsel, IP & Open Source

Airbnb’s Legal Department is a global team that will require working with diverse international colleagues around the world. The successful candidate will be someone who is adaptable, collaborative and embodies Airbnb’s Core Values. Candidates will be required to approach complex legal issues with a balance for local and global perspectives, while being adaptable to cultural differences and nuances. A genuine and demonstrated interest in Airbnb and a commitment to ethics, integrity and fostering a workplace that emphasizes diversity and belonging is a must.

The Community You Will Join: 

Airbnb is seeking a highly qualified Associate Counsel to join our Commercial & Technology Legal Team with a focus on intellectual property and open source. The successful candidate will be adaptable, collaborative, and embody Airbnb’s Core Values. You’ll bring strong judgment and a practical, business-forward approach to advising teams building products and infrastructure used by millions—helping Airbnb move quickly while protecting the company’s IP, brand, and technology ecosystem. A genuine and demonstrated interest in Airbnb and a commitment to ethics, integrity, and fostering a workplace that emphasizes diversity and belonging is a must.

The Difference You Will Make:

You will provide day-to-day legal support on intellectual property and open source matters that shape how Airbnb builds, uses, and shares technology. You’ll advise on IP licensing and transactions and partner with cross-functional teams to strengthen open source governance and compliance. You will also support Airbnb’s Tech Brand initiatives from concept through publication—providing legal review and practical risk guidance for external communications, technical storytelling, and developer- and community-facing programs. Your work will enable innovation and technology-focused storytelling with clear guardrails—supporting engineering velocity while protecting Airbnb’s brand, IP, and marketplace integrity.

A Typical Day: 

• Provide practical legal advice on a wide range of IP matters for data science, engineering, and business teams, including licensing issues tied to product development, tooling, and infrastructure, and issues relating to actual and potential disclosure of IP in external communications.
• Draft, review, and negotiate IP-related terms in commercial and intercompany agreements.
• Partner with cross-functional stakeholders to identify repeatable IP issues and help build templates, guidance, and escalation paths that enable faster, more consistent decision-making.
• Support the open source program by providing legal review and pragmatic guidance on licensing, compliance, and contribution practices (inbound use and outbound releases), including through internal workflows and Open Source Committee processes and escalation of higher-risk or novel issues.
• Partner with cross-functional stakeholders (e.g., Engineering, Security, Infrastructure, Tech Brand) to improve open source policies and “policy-to-practice” workflows (intake, approvals, documentation, and training).
• Advise on open source governance topics such as:
• Usage & Contributing: internal use of third-party open source, contributing to external projects, CLA review, and risk assessments for security/privacy implications.
• Owning & Releasing: guidance on when and how Airbnb code may be open sourced, quality/maintenance expectations, community/code-of-conduct considerations, and project sunsetting.
• Permissions & Access: legal input on access models for public repositories and contributor status (in collaboration with relevant internal owners).
• Review and advise on external-facing Tech Brand materials, which may include:
• blog posts, technical articles, and engineering announcements
• conference talks, presentation decks, and speaker participation
• developer/community programs, events, and related communications
• web content and social media posts tied to technology storytelling
• Identify and help manage key legal issues in Tech Brand workstreams, including:
• intellectual property (copyright, trademark, licensing, attribution)
• confidentiality and protection of trade secrets (what can/can’t be shared externally)
• content substantiation and claims risk (as applicable)
• third-party rights and permissions (quotes, images, code snippets, datasets, logos)
• open source-adjacent considerations (e.g., references to Airbnb OSS, contribution/release messaging, license/attribution basics in communications)
• Partner closely with Marketing, Comms, and colleagues in Legal to support consistent guidance across brand, marketing, and technology narratives.
• Create and maintain playbooks, templates, and training materials to help legal colleagues and business partners spot and resolve common IP and open source issues efficiently.
• Liaise with international colleagues to promote consistent guidance across regions and help enable global initiatives.

This role is an individual contributor and requires you to be licensed to practice law in at least one U.S. jurisdiction.

Your Expertise:

• J.D. degree and active membership in good standing in one or more U.S. jurisdictions.
• At least three years of relevant legal experience (law firm, government and/or in-house), with meaningful experience in IP transactions and licensing and advising technology-focused teams.
• Working knowledge of intellectual property law, including copyright, trademark, and patent fundamentals, and how these apply in technology and product contexts.
• Experience drafting and negotiating IP provisions in a range of agreements (including technology-related transactions and intercompany agreements).
• Working knowledge of open source licensing concepts and compliance considerations; ability to issue clear, pragmatic guidance to technical teams.
• Strong analytical, problem-solving, and risk-framing skills; able to make practical cost/benefit tradeoffs in a fast-moving environment.
• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, including the ability to translate complex legal issues into clear guidance for non-lawyers at all levels.
• Proven ability to manage multiple matters simultaneously, prioritize effectively, and drive issues to resolution with high ownership.
• Ability to operate independently on day-to-day matters, with sound judgment on when to escalate.

Additional Qualifications (Preferred)

• At least five years of relevant experience advising engineering, data science, infrastructure, or developer platform teams.
• Familiarity with common open source licenses (e.g., MIT, Apache 2.0, GPL/LGPL) and typical compliance workflows (e.g., dependency review, notices, attribution, policy-based approvals).
• Familiarity with marketing/advertising law concepts that can arise in external messaging (e.g., FTC considerations, endorsements/testimonials, substantiation, comparative claims).
• Familiarity with sponsored research agreements and contracting with private and public universities.
• Experience building scalable legal enablement (templates, intake processes, training, and playbooks) for repeatable issues.
• Comfort partnering cross-functionally with technical teams on external-facing communications.

Your Location:

This position is US - Remote Eligible. The role may include occasional work at an Airbnb office or attendance at offsites, as agreed to with your manager. While the position is Remote Eligible, you must live in a state where Airbnb, Inc. has a registered entity. Click here for the up-to-date list of excluded states. This list is continuously evolving, so please check back with us if the state you live in is on the exclusion list  If your position is employed by another Airbnb entity, your recruiter will inform you what states you are eligible to work from.

Our Commitment To Inclusion & Belonging:

Airbnb is committed to working with the broadest talent pool possible. We believe diverse ideas foster innovation and engagement, and allow us to attract creatively-led people, and to develop the best products, services and solutions. All qualified individuals are encouraged to apply.

We strive to also provide a disability inclusive application and interview process. If you are a candidate with a disability and require reasonable accommodation in order to submit an application, please contact us at: [email protected]. Please include your full name, the role you’re applying for and the accommodation necessary to assist you with the recruiting process. 

We ask that you only reach out to us if you are a candidate whose disability prevents you from being able to complete our online application.