Online Personals Watch: News on the Online Dating Industry and Business

Spark Networks Partners With ParshipMeet Group to Deliver Livestreaming Video to Users

PR NEWSWIRE - Mar 31 - Spark Networks will deliver livestreaming video to its largest brand, Zoosk, via an agreement with ParshipMeet Group, a leading provider of interactive dating solutions. Spark will leverage ParshipMeet Group's Live video Platform as a Service (vPaaS) product, which powers some of the world's largest livestreaming video dating apps by monetizing user videos. Geoff Cook, CEO The Meet Group and GM Video ParshipMeet Group said "Nearly 250,000 dating games now take place across our Live communities every day allowing members to connect, safely meet, and fall in love."

See full article at PR Newswire

See the top news on Zoosk
See the top news on ParshipMeet Group

Tinder a Main Way to Connect Post-Covid, Says CEO

BLOOMBERG - Mar 31 - Jim Lanzone, CEO of Tinder, discusses the business during 2020, which was the company's busiest year, the unprecedented changes in consumer behavior during the Covid-19 pandemic and how dating will change when the world gets back to normal. The app is relaunching free Tinder Passport for the month of April following last year's success.

See full article at Bloomberg Technology

See the top news on Tinder

co-Founders of eHarmony Offer Marriage Advice

KY3 - Mar 31 - Drs. Les and Leslie Parrott co-founded eHarmony and designed the algorithms that match couples for online dating. Now they are using their research to help already married couples. VIDEO

See full article at KY3

See the top news on eHarmony

Arizona Cardinals Star JJ Watt Joins Top NBA Agent and Tinder CEO in Launching SPAC

SEEKING ALPHA - Mar 30 - NFL star JJ Watt is the latest athlete to join the SPAC world, teaming up with NBA super-agent Rich Paul, Tinder CEO Jim Lanzone and others on a $150M IPO for special purpose acquisition company Coliseum Acquisition Corp. The new SPAC aims to acquire consumer-products/services or media companies "at the intersection of sports, entertainment, digital media and/or technology." The executives added that they plan to focus on buying businesses worth $500M to $2.5B.

by Jerry Kronenberg
See full article at Seeking Alpha

See the top news on Tinder

Dating App Snack: 'TikTok Meets Tinder'

CRUNCHBASE - Mar 31 - TikTok has never been bigger, and singles have arguably never been lonelier. Kaplan, who previously worked at PlentyOfFish for around a decade, had the idea for Snack around March 2020. Then, the COVID-19 pandemic hit, but watching TikTok blow up and the content on the platform only amplified her belief that video dating would be the next big thing. Snack launched in September, and the company announced a $3.5M pre-seed round in February. Users are scrolling through videos instead of swiping. Once both users like each other, that's when they can actually start to message one another. Snack is more meant to be a TikTok, or an Instagram where users are continually uploading new content. And kind of showing someone what's going on in their life.

by Sophia Kunthara
See full article at Crunchbase

See the top news on Snack

Meet Daniel Newman, CEO of Dandy

BIGTIMEDAILY - Mar 30 - Three years ago, Newman began his journey as a full-time CEO of his very own tech startup named Dandy. He created the company with his partner and co-founder, Leor Massachi, while the two were seniors in college. Newman started a tutoring company at age 17. Later he started his second small business with Leor Massachi, called Geocasion. It was a design agency that helped businesses market toward the Gen Z demographic via custom-made interactive Geofilters on Snapchat. In addition to founding Geocasion, Newman also founded USC's TAMID Tank event during his sophomore year, which is the school's equivalent to the TV show, Shark Tank. With Dandy, they wanted to create a version of a dating app that would mimic two people meeting in person for the first time. Users would log onto the app once it went "live", and they would have an allotted time to find their match. Once two users established they were interested, they'd be transferred into a three-minute video call. Dandy has fundraised ~$3.3M in a matter of months from investors involved in companies such as Uber, Airbnb, Snapchat, and Facebook. In Feb 2020, they decided to rebrand Dandy into Zoom University, a virtual dating app with two-on-two video calls resembling that of a double date.

by Matthew Wiles
See full article at BigTimeDaily

See the top news on Dandy

Sugarbook CEO Claims Local Media Misled People Regarding His Arrest Warrant

TECH IN ASIA - Mar 30 - Sugarbook's founder and CEO Darren Chan has refuted local media reports claiming that he was arrested after he had failed to appear at the Malaysian court on Friday last week. Chan said that he was present at the appointed time, and that the magistrate revoked the arrest warrant against him on account of a "technical glitch" regarding the scheduling process. Earlier in February, the CEO was charged over the publication of a post about sugar baby universities in the country, allegedly with the intention to cause fear or unrest to the public.

by Deepti Sri
See full article at Tech in Asia

See the top news on Sugarbook

Spark Networks Has Found a Path to Profitability

SIMPLY WALL ST - Mar 30 - The $164M market-cap company posted a loss in its most recent financial year of €15M and a latest trailing-twelve-month loss of €11M shrinking the gap between loss and breakeven. Many investors are wondering about the rate at which Spark Networks will turn a profit. Expectations from analysts is that Spark Networks is on the verge of breakeven. They anticipate the company to incur a final loss in 2020, before generating positive profits of €8.2M in 2021. One thing we would like to bring into light with Spark Networks is its relatively high level of debt. Typically, debt shouldn't exceed 40% of your equity, which in Spark Networks' case is 60%. A higher level of debt requires more stringent capital management which increases the risk around investing in the loss-making company.

See full article at Yahoo Finance

See the top news on Spark Networks

BU Marriage Pact Matches Compatible Students

DAILY FREE PRESS - Mar 30 - Boston University students are turning to the Marriage Pact, a matchmaking service that uses math to pair up students looking for love, friendship or anything in between. The BU Marriage Pact is one of many arms of an initiative started at Stanford University in 2017, which uses a survey of 50 questions as well as its own algorithm to match those interested in a long-term relationship. The BU launch follows an expansion of the Marriage Pact to schools across the country, including Boston College.

by Molly Farrar
See full article at Daily Free Press

Grindr's US Security Review Disclosures Contradicted Statements Made to Others

REUTERS - Mar 29 - When Grindr's Chinese owner sold the app to an investor consortium last year to comply with a U.S. national security panel order, the parties to the deal gave information to authorities that contradicted disclosures to potential investors and Chinese regulators. They told the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) that James Lu, a Chinese-American businessman who is now Grindr's chairman, had no previous business relationship with a key adviser to the seller, a man named Ding'an Fei. Fei, a former private equity executive, was acting as an adviser to Beijing Kunlun Tech Co Ltd, Grindr's owner at the time, on the deal, the documents show. The duo had also done business together in other ventures. This could lead to civil penalties and criminal charges under the false statement provisions of the U.S. penal code.

by Echo Wang
See full article at Reuters

See the top news on Grindr

Can Relationship Tech Create the Next Tinder?

SIFTED.EU - Mar 29 - Startups are finding digital solutions to fix love and relationships. The challenge now is getting investors to fall head over heels for them. This boom in 'relationship tech' is long overdue, according to Jas Bagniewski, the cofounder of Lover: a couples' sex therapy app. Lover charges $9.99/week. The app has attracted 5K paying users since launching last year in the US. Paired is a London-based app which gives couples daily communication prompts and coaching. The app boasts ~10k daily active users, and raised a $1M pre-seed round. The 10-person company is already targeting the US and Australian markets, and says its goal is to have 100K paying subscribers in the next 12-18 months. "It's definitely scalable," says Paired CEO and cofounder Kevin Shanahan, adding that retention rates are above-average for 'wellness' apps. As for how effective these apps are, the data generally looks promising. Marriage coaching app Lasting claims that 94% of its couples report new strengths. Lover reports that most users report a 50% drop in their distress score after using the product for just two weeks. Meanwhile, an independent study found 85% of Paired couples reported improved communication when using the app daily.

by Isabel Woodford
See full article at Sifted.eu

Latinx Dating App Chispa Partners With Party Card Game Tragos

PEOPLE EN ESPANOL - Mar 29 - The two brands are working together to make breaking the ice a little bit easier. Users can play a game virtually and get matched with people who submit the same answers.

by Alma Sacasa
See full article at People en Espanol

See the top news on Chispa

Match Group Dodges Securities Fraud Suit for Now

LAW360 - Mar 26 - A Texas federal judge axed a shareholder's proposed class action alleging that Match Group turned a blind eye to a fraudulent user base in favor of profit, finding that the investors failed to demonstrate that Match made false or misleading statements about its financial and operational conditions.

See full article at Law360

See the top news on Match Group

Think Like a Behavioral Scientist to Amp up Your Influencer Marketing

OPW - Mar 29 - I studied behavioral science because I wanted to understand why people did things in digital environments, not just what they did. We all do AB testing. But why do people do the things they do, and make the (sometimes fast and flawed) decisions they do? Behavioral science helps digital marketers form a better understanding of decision making, biases and heuristics.

See full post on Courtland Brooks blog for behavioral science advice and Courtland Brooks advice on influencer marketing.

The Rise of Multi-partner Relationships

BBC - Mar 27 - In 2016, a survey of 9K single US adults showed that one in five had previously been in a consensually non-monogamous relationship. A Canadian survey came up with roughly the same numbers a year later. Multiple non-monogamy-geared dating apps make it easy to find others looking for multiple partner relationships or sexual experiences. On Feeld, a poly and kink dating app, 60% of couples are looking for a third, says a company spokesperson.

by Jessica Klein
See full article at BBC

See the top news on Feeld