OPW – May 25 – I'm in Beijing now, at the very fine Crowne Plaza U-Town. Marc Lesnick informs me that we have a stellar room full of senior executives attending from the top dating sites in Japan, India, China, and Australia. Dating operators represent OVER 90% of the attendance. Normally its 60-70%. Past Asian iDate conferences have been intense discussion and learning sessions so I'm looking forward to getting more insight and updates on this vast burgeoning market.
Post by Mark Brooks @
USA TODAY – May 22 - AdultFriendFinder has contacted law enforcement and high-profile security firm FireEye to investigate a data breach. Information including sexual preference, marital status and other personal data (dates of birth, email addresses and addresses) for as many as 4M members may have been stolen.
by Mike Snider
See full article at USA Today
CHINAMONEYNETWORK – May 21 - Baihe.com has completed RMB1.5 billion ($242M) new round of financing, and is planning for an IPO on China's domestic stock exchange by the end of this year. The investors' identities are not revealed, but reportedly include several publicly listed Chinese companies and a number of private equity and brokerage firms.
by Nina Xiang
See full article at ChinaMoneyNetwork
Mark Brooks: I'm interviewing Jason Tian, the CEO of Baihe, at the Internet Dating Conference in Beijing this Thursday. Please comment here or email me at mark@courtlandbrooks.com with any questions you recommend I ask. Thanks.
This post also appears on InternetDatingInvestments.
WASHINGTON POST – May 21 – Washington DC is the country’s most adulterous city for the third year in a row, according to AshleyMadison.com, a dating site for married people looking for extramarital affairs. Capitol Hill, the land of politicians, staffers and lobbyists is the neighborhood with the most cheaters. AM says 10.4% of Capitol Hill residents are registered on the site.
10 cities with the highest rate of membership on the site:
by Perry Stein
See full article at Washington Post
BUSINESS INSIDER – May 20 – After establishing online furniture site Zanui in Australia, founder Dean Kelly went to San Fran and met his future business partner, Justin Parfitt, who at the time was working on high-end speed dating events called Fast Impressions which he later sold to POF. They launched HeyLets after they wondered why they were reading negative reviews about experiences from people they had nothing in common with. The founders recently closed $1.65M in seed funding from Blue Sky Ventures and a handful of angel investors. The app startup is aiming to raise its series A round in the next three to six months. There have been ~100K downloads to date and an Android version is on the way. Built for mobile, users upload a photo and 200 characters about an experience they enjoyed, rather than a review of a place so it focuses on recommendations.
TECHINASIA – May 20 - Momo has now grown to 78.1M monthly active users (MAUs), up 13% from the end of 2014, and up 83% YOY. Momo started as a location-based dating apps in China in 2011. The company has ambitions for the US market as well. After initially failing with a straight-up English version, the firm came out with an all-new app for overseas markets called Blupe. Is the same idea as Nextdoor or Microsoft’s Inlope – a social discovery network.
by Steven Millward
The full article was originally published at TechInAsia, but is no longer available.
ADWEEK – May 20 – 20th Century Fox has launched an ad campaign on Tinder for its forthcoming comedy Spy. Four of the movie's characters got fake Tinder accounts, and fans who "swipe right" can RSVP to attend a local screening. Advertising is still new territory for Tinder, with Bud Light running the app's first ads last month. Over the past six months alone, ad revenue at Grindr has grown 65%. Clients include State Farm, HotelTonight and Crunch Fitness. Advertising is still a small revenue source for dating apps. 75% of Grindr revenue comes from its ad-free paid app, which costs users $10/month.
by Lauren Johnson
See full article at AdWeek
MACWORLD – May 20 – Tinder, OkCupid and Match.com were quickly to introduce a Watch app, but a few other lesser-known dating sites introduced Apple watch apps this month. Clover cuts to the chase with its "on-demand" dating. With two taps, the Clover Watch app finds users a nearby date and suggests hotspots where the two can meet. WatchMe88 works like a radar that detects singles nearby. Apple Watch faces start to glow if two compatible users are close to each other. Another app in development is "Close Encounter". The app ditches the profile photos and focuses on personality. Users get notified whenever there's a match nearby. Jack'd claims to have created the first Apple Watch app for gay guys.
by Oscar Raymundo
See full article at Macworld
GLOBE NEWSWIRE – May 18 – Momo's Q1 revenue increased 383% YOY to $26.3M. Net income was $6.7M, compared to a net loss of $1.2M in Q1 2014. Monthly Active Users (MAU)1 were 78.1M in March 2015, an increase of 83% YOY. Membership subscription revenues were $13M, up 311% YOY. Momo paid members reached 3.1M. Mobile games revenues were $6.1M, up 212% YOY.