TECH CRUNCH – Dec 11 – French dating app Happn just raised an $8M Series A round from Alven Capital and DN Capital, as well as business angels, such as Fabrice Grinda. Happn uses phone’s location to show users potential matches. Happn is now available in Paris, London, Berlin, Barcelona, Madrid and New York. Out of its user base of 1M people, 200K people use Happn every day.
by Romain Dillet
See full article at Tech Crunch
This post also apperas on InternetDatingInvestments.
DAILYRECORD.CO.UK – Dec 8 – Cupid's shares dropped 24% on Monday on the announcement it plans to sell off its remaining dating sites as it looks to reclassify as an investment company. Cupid has agreed to sell off its core dating sites Cupid, UniformDating and LoveBeginsAt, to Tradax IP Licensing, Together Network Holdings and Together Networks for £3M. It also proposes to rename itself Castle Street Investments plc if plans to reclassify as an investment company are approved.
by Scott McCulloch
See full article at DailyRecord.co.uk
This post also appears on InternetDatingInvestments.
STV EDINBURGH – Dec 4 - Tangle is a new location-based dating app developed with Cupid. On top of matching people who 'like' each other, it also sends push notifications to users when they walk past each other in the street or are in the same cafe or club.
by Claire White
See full article at STV Edinburgh
HUFFINGTON POST – Dec 4 – Rachael Wardle, 26, has launched datemy.co.uk, an online matchmaking site that encourages singles' nearest and dearest (sibling, daughter, son) to find them matches and help find love.
Q: How did you get the idea for "Datemy”?
A: I was inspired by a real life matchmaking story. My dad was a single widow when I was growing up. He was set up with a family friend and went on to marry two years later. Datemy was originally going to be a single parent matchmaking platform, but a lot of people know someone single they would love to set up.
Q: How did you get the money for it?
A: I crowd funded datemy back in January on banktothefuture.com.
Q: What is the ambition for the business?
A: For datemy to be an international and profitable brand.
BBC NEWS MAGAZINE – Nov 11 – The book "London: The Information Capital" is a series of data portraits based on figures from the 2011 Census that reveal that singles in London make the move toward marriage by their 30s and tend to migrate from inner to outer London. The young and single prefer to live close to town in trendy areas like Hoxton and Clapham. Once people have started living with a partner, many prefer to move a little further away from the centre of the city, and finally settling in outer London as they marry.
PIANETACELLULARE.IT – Nov 5 – Dating site Meetic has launched a new Meetic Wear App. The app for Android Wear smartwatch is designed with a simple interface.
See full article at PianetAcellulare.it
Mark Brooks: The first Android Wear app by a major dating site. Bravo Meetic.
This post also appears on Wearable.ai.
TELECOMPAPER – Oct 15 – Bitkom Research in corporation with Aris report that 36% were successful and found a partner. Among young people age 14-29, 23% has tried it. 16% of age 30-49, and 14% of 50-64. While 12% of Germans have signed up for a dating website, the study showed that only 8% are actively using the service. Only 25% of users were willing to pay.
IFAMAGAZINE – Oct 13 – Richard Griffith, one of Cupid’s top-five shareholders, has raised his share capital from 3.9% to 8.9% after buying up 3.2M shares. Cupid reported last month that revenues in H1 declined to £7.2M from £9.4M in H2 2013 due to lower direct marketing spend, a more competition market and delays in implementing product changes.
The full article was originally published at IFA Magazine, but is no longer available.
STL TODAY – Oct 11 – A Nigerian man, accused of running an online “romance scam” that victimized ~30 women in USA, has been arrested in London. He pretended to be a member of the military, using information and photos he’d stolen from real people on online dating sites.
by Robert Patrick
See full article at STL Today
THE DRUM – Oct 1 – The app will use geo-tagging to track users and connect them with nearby Tangle users for conversation. Setting the app apart from established apps is its real-time tracking feature meaning users will always be connected with individuals in the local area. Furthermore, ‘right-swiped’ matches will be available to view with users capable of messaging each other without being matched. It is available for download on the Android platform with a subsequent iOS version due out later in October.
by John McCarthy
See full article at The Drum