ECONOMIC TIMES – Mar 22 – Sankara Narayanan, former Aircel top executive who had joined Matrimony.com as COO, has quit just a little over two months after joining the company. Four months ago, K Balasubramanian resigned as CFO. The company had replaced Balasubramanian with former Mindtree top executive Sushanth Pai.
by Bharani Vaitheesvaran
See full article at Economic Times
INDIA TIMES – Mar 9 – In India, matrimonial profiles of self-employed people have traditionally been preferred by the business community. Rajasekar KS, general manager at Matrimony.com, which runs matchmaking website Bharat Matrimony, said there's been a marked increase in the preference for entrepreneurs over the last few years. "It is largely driven by the increasing success stories of entrepreneurs," he said. Gourav Rakshit, CEO of Shaadi.com, said: "Over 20% women have shown interest in entrepreneurs." Another change is that more women are now in control of their profiles, as opposed to their parents doing the monitoring.
by Anjali Venugopalan
See full article at India Times
TIMES OF INDIA – TrulyMadly is one of the bigger and older local ventures in India. Co-founder & COO Snehil Khanor says the company caters to both casual and serious users, "but there's definitely more money in older cohorts." He says 80% of its paying users mention on their profile that they are looking for something serious. 50% of TrulyMadly users are 28+ years old, and 70% 26+. Sumesh Menon, co-founder and CEO of matchmaking app Woo, also says money flows in only from older users, who are both socially and financially dependent. BetterHalf.AI too pitches itself as a "serious matchmaking product for working professionals looking to get married in the next 1-2 years." Co-founder and CEO Pawan Gupta says matrimony sites are too overwhelming for today's generation. Matrimony, Shaadi and others that traditionally relied on revenue from parents, are transforming to attract singles while keeping parents still involved in the process. Murugavel Janakiraman, founder and CEO of Matrimony.com, says till the mid-2000s, parents registered on behalf of their daughters and sons. Not any more. "Today, ~60% of our 3.7M active members are individuals who register on their own." Investments in the segment have been small, and was at its peak in 2015 at $6.3M. That was the year when TrulyMadly raised $5.3M and iCrushiFlush raised $0.5M. Last year there was just one funding deal. According to comScore data, the number of unique visitors to Tinder in India had risen to as high as that of Shaadi in late 2017, and had continued to challenge the local players.
by Sindhu Hariharan
See full article at Times of India
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by Saritha Rai
See full article at Bloomberg
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OPW – Jan 16 – IDEA exists to help the dating industry grow and achieve its true potential. I feel this industry is still entirely fledgling, and we can do more by learning and sharing on important issues and opportunities. OPW.news helps, but we can do more.
IDEA WOW in Malta in November was an experiment. It went very well, but attendees wanted more. We listened carefully and the result is the first IDEA WOW + IDEA SUMMIT which will take place in Chennai in April. The event will be hosted by Muru Janakiraman, CEO/Founder of Matrimony, and I, Mark Brooks.
Last week I invited C level friends in the dating industry and I'm enormously humbled that just 72 hours later it was full. 18 dating executives are speaking. 13 of them are CEOs, 11 are founders and 11 have 15+ years in dating, The event is now full, but I'm sure we'll be doing more. Please let me know your thoughts on what you'd like to see from IDEA, and how we can improve this event concept further at mark@courtlandbrooks.com. Thanks. – Mark Brooks
FINANCIAL TIMES – Dec 30 – Bumble launched in India earlier this month, with the high-profile backing of Bollywood actress Priyanka Chopra. At the same time, Tinder has rolled out new features designed to cement its foothold in the country, where it has been operating since 2015. Happn, which matches app users who have crossed paths in real life, has become one of the most downloaded dating apps since coming to India last year. Yet the companies may find Indians difficult to woo. Homegrown matchmaking services with names such as Shaadi.com and Mumbai-listed Matrimony.com, which went public last year in a $78M listing, flourished in India since long before smartphones. According to Matrimony.com almost nine in 10 marriages in India are arranged. But Matrimony.com's share price has fallen 45% over the past year, and profits in the most-recent quarter fell 30% YOY to $1.9M. The foreign apps have yet to prove that the Indian market can be lucrative. Whitney Wolfe, Bumble's CEO and founder, said: "We're entering with purpose, with mission, with a really nuanced, customised product." Far more men in India use dating apps than women, who often stay away due to safety concerns and stigma. ~85% of Happn's users in India are men. But Bumble argues its women-first brand and safety features mean it is best placed to attract female users. In September, Tinder introduced a tool that also gave Indian women the prerogative to initiate a conversation with a match.
by Benjamin Parkin
See full article at Financial Times
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TRADE ARABIA – Dec 7 – Matrimony.com, a leader in online matrimony, has entered the UAE market through its flagship brand BharatMatrimony as part of its strategic expansion plans. The platform has inaugurated an office at Fortune Executive Tower, Jumeirah Lake Towers, Dubai, to serve Indians in the Middle East region. Matrimony.com, a publicly-listed company, is headquartered in Chennai, India.
See full article at Trade Arabia
TECH CIRCLE – Nov 27 – Matrimony.com, the parent company of Indian matchmaking platform BharatMatrimony, has appointed former Mindtree executive Sushanth Pai as its new CFO. He will replace K Balasubramanian, who is retiring. Matrimony.com was founded in 1997 by Murugavel Janakiraman. Its brands include BharatMatrimony, CommunityMatrimony and EliteMatrimony. The company acquired SecondShaadi in March to consolidate its offering for those looking to marry again. For the Q3, Matrimony reported a 12% increase in revenue to Rs 86.23 crore ($12M).
by Vijayakumar Pitchiah
See full article at Tech Circle
PRESS TRUST OF INDIA – Nov 3 – Matrimony.com has appointed Sankara Narayanan as the chief operating officer with immediate effect. Narayanan had served telecom operator Aircel as its national operations-Head and Vodafone Essar as its CEO.
See full article at Business Standard
TIMES OF INDIA – Nov 1 – Matrimony.com reported revenues of Rs 88.2 crore for the September quarter, posting a 5.4% growth from the same period last year, and a 1.5% fall from the June quarter. The company's net profit for the quarter stood at Rs. 13.4 crore, as against Rs 19.2 crore in the corresponding quarter of 2017, recording a 30% fall. The company attributed the decline in profit to higher marketing spend of almost Rs 5.8 crore incurred this period. "We will continue to invest additionally in marketing and as a result the EBITDA margin will be lower than the earlier period," said Murugavel Janakiraman, MD, Matrimony.com. ~95% of the company's revenue comes from its matchmaking business, while its marriage services.
by Sindhu Hariharan
See full article at Times of India