WOMEN'S AGENDA – Feb 1 – At just 31-years old, Whitney Wolfe Herd has become the youngest ever female CEO to take a company public. Wolfe Herd has has an extraordinary career so far. She was one of the co-founders of Tinder, becoming its VP of Marketing a few years later. In 2014, she founded the female-focused dating and social app Bumble, which is now the second most downloaded dating app in the U.S. The app allows women to make the first move. As a woman, Wolfe Herd remains a minority in her sector. From a total of 442 companies that went public last year, only 4 had female founders or CEOs. Bumble has ~650 full-time staff and is headquartered in Austin, Texas. It also has offices in London and Moscow and a data centre in Prague.
Category: Bumble
Bumble Bans Fatphobic Messages and Body Shaming
MASHABLE – Jan 28 – Bumble will be modifying its terms and conditions to prohibit unsolicited, pejorative, disrespectful comments about someone's body shape, size, health, or appearance. Comments that are fatphobic, ableist, racist, colourist, transphobic, or homophobic will also be prohibited. The ban will apply to comments made through the dating app's chat function.
Bumble Is Revamping the Virtual Dating Scene
LOCALSYR.COM – Jan 26 – Bumble has been revamping their approach and Head of Editorial Content Clare O’Connor says they have have seen a change in the way people are dating amid a pandemic. It’s known as ‘slow-mo dating’. Clare says people are taking longer on the app and staying safe too.
Bumble’s Bet on Women Won’t Pay off Everywhere
WALL STREET JOURNAL – Jan 21 – A higher percentage of the Bumble app's users convert to payers than the market average among dating apps, according to OC&C Strategy Consultants – ~9% paid conversion among its 12.3M monthly active users, the company said. But a women-centric approach also could pose some limitations to growth. Historical gender norms might be more difficult to disrupt outside the U.S. In India, Bumble didn't break the top 10 in terms of consumer spending. Interestingly, Tinder tested a feature in India around the time of Bumble's launch there called "My Move," which allowed women to initiate conversation. Depending on its success, Tinder said it would consider launching the app more globally. Ominously for Bumble, Tinder hasn't indicated plans to roll out the feature anywhere else.
Dating Apps and Videoconferencing Could Be Monitored in New EU Data Rules
EURACTIV – Jan 21 – Dating apps and videoconferencing tools could come under the scope of new EU efforts to monitor online communications in a bid to stamp out child sexual abuse material. In a series of private exchanges between MEPs and Commission services, the EU executive has attempted to clarify a number of concerns related to proposed rules that would allow online communications services to be vetted for child abuse content. In one exchange, the Commission is pressed on whether it considers 'dating apps,' such as Tinder, Bumble and OkCupid, part of the new rules. The response was that while assessments should be made on a case-by-case basis, "the communications features of dating apps may constitute NI-ICS, unless they are merely ancillary features."
First Look At Bumble’s IPO
SEEKING ALPHA – Jan 20 – Bumble is reportedly seeking a $6-8B valuation. In 2019, Blackstone purchased a majority stake in the company that valued the company at $3B, representing quite a sizable return in a short amount of time. Across its two apps, Bumble and Badoo, the company has 42M monthly active users. Badoo is the fourth-largest (by gross revenue) dating app in the world.
In terms of sizing: Badoo actually has more MAUs than Bumble, with 28.4M as of the end of Sep 2020. This is more than double Bumble's 12.3M MAUs. However, Bumble users are more likely to be premium users; hence, the Bumble brand actually generates ~60% of the combined company's revenue versus ~40% for Badoo. This is why Bumble, despite the smaller user base, is the #2 grossing dating app in the world, behind Tinder. The global online dating market stood at $5.3B in 2020 and is expected to grow 13% YOY to $9.9B by the end of 2025. Despite the rapid and broad adoption of online dating in recent years, only 15% of users are paid subscribers. Given the normalization of paying for multiple services, especially driven by COVID-19, we expect this number to continue trending upward. Bumble's total paid users grew 19% YOY to 2.44M, with the Bumble app indexing at a faster 30% YOY growth rate versus 11% YOY growth for Badoo.
by Gary Alexander
See full article at Seeking Alpha
Capitol Riots: Bumble Unblocks Politics Filter
BBC.COM – Jan 19 – Bumble has reinstated its political preferences filter after disabling it "to prevent misuse" in the wake of the US Capitol riots. Following the violence, reports emerged online of some Bumble users switching the filter to find those who had taken part – and report them to authorities. Match Group has banned any users wanted by the FBI in connection with domestic terrorism from all of its platforms.
Dating Apps Are Using Images From the Siege to Ban Rioters’ Accounts
WASHINGTON POST – Jan 18 – Bumble, Tinder and others are freezing out rioters with help from law enforcement and, in some cases, their own photos. Other app users have taken matters into their own hands by striking up conversations with potential rioters and relaying their information to the FBI. Some onlookers have celebrated the viral hunt as a creative form of digital comeuppance. But some privacy advocates said the episode reveals a worrying truth about pervasive public surveillance and the opaque connections between private companies and law enforcement. Both Bumble and Match Group said they were working to remove users known to be involved in the Capitol siege from their platforms.
by Drew Harwell, Lisa Bonos & Craig Timberg
See full article at Washington Post
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Bumble CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd’s Letter
BUSINESS INSIDER – Jan 18 – Whitney Wolfe Herd, who cofounded rival dating app Tinder, launched Bumble in 2014. In a letter accompanying Bumble's S-1 paperwork, Herd celebrated Bumble's women-first approach as well as "1.7B first moves made by women." You can read the full letter here.
Bumble IPO Filing Details $125M Cash Payout and Loan to Founder
FINANCIAL TIMES – Jan 18 – Bumble founder Whitney Wolfe Herd received a $125M payout following a complex reorganisation of the dating app's parent company, according to a regulatory filing ahead of its IPO. Bumble also loaned $119M to an entity controlled by Ms Wolfe Herd. She settled the remainder of the loan this month. The company reported 42.1M monthly active users across Badoo and Bumble at the end of Sep, of which ~2.4M were paying users. But the company's growth has slowed since Blackstone agreed to purchase a majority stake in 2019 and installed Ms Wolfe Herd as CEO. Bumble reported net losses of $117M in the first nine months of last year, a reversal from positive earnings of $69M during the same period in 2019, but a figure that the company said was affected by transaction costs. In the first nine months of 2020, Bumble reported revenues of $417M, up 14.9% YOY. The company said it would use IPO proceeds largely to pay down debt and repurchase equity interests from private shareholders.
by Miles Kruppa & Hannah Murphy
See full article at Financial Times