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

AI Is Transforming India's Matrimony Industry

THE WALRUS - India has ~1,500 matrimony platforms, a market worth hundreds of millions of dollars. Betterhalf.ai, launched in 2016, competes with Shaadi.com, Jeevansathi, and Matrimony.com by using AI for matchmaking without parental involvement. Traditional arranged marriages still dominate, with 90% of Indian marriages arranged, and on Shaadi.com, 40–50% of profiles are managed by parents. Matrimony.com, India's largest publicly listed matrimony platform, had a market value of ~$16M and annual revenue of $57M, 850K subscribers, and ~100K successful matches as of 2021. Betterhalf.ai, founded by MIT graduates Gupta and Namdev, has 1M monthly users and a 30% paid subscriber retention rate, outperforming Bumble, Hinge, and Tinder (10% retention). In March 2023, it raised $8.5M from investors, including Instagram and Dropbox co-founders. The company plans to evolve into a "marriage super app," offering wedding services, pregnancy support, and more.

by Mihika Agarwal
See full article at The Walrus

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Betterhalf Transforms Into a Holistic Wedding Services Platform, Eyeing Global Expansion

BWDISRUPT - Betterhalf, founded by MIT alumni Pawan Gupta, has evolved from a top AI-driven matrimonial app with verified profiles to a comprehensive wedding services provider in India. The platform, catering to urban professionals in Tier 1 cities, integrates matchmaking, courtship, and wedding services. Despite a challenging funding environment, Betterhalf raised $8.5M in its Series A round and $11M overall. It's now expanding globally to regions like Southeast Asia and the UAE.

by Nitesh Kumar
See full article at BWDisrupt

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Betterhalf Matrimony Startup Announces Second Share Buyback, Hits $500K Monthly Revenue

INC42 - AI-based matrimony and wedding planning startup Betterhalf has announced a second Employee Stock Option Plan (ESOP) buyback, benefiting 29 current and former employees. This follows the company's first share buyback in 2022. Betterhalf also revealed it has reached $500K in monthly revenue. Founded in 2016, the company targets high-income individuals in India's major cities and claims to get 60% of its wedding customers from its matchmaking service. The startup, which recently raised $8.5M in a Series A funding round, competes with platforms like Shaadi.com and aims to revolutionize India's wedding industry.

by Sudeshna Mitra
See full article at INC42

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Betterhalf Appoints Asha Ji (Sheeba Chaddha) as Chief Matchmaking Officer

MEDIABRIEF - Betterhalf introduces "Asha Ji", the first-ever Chief Matchmaking Officer, portrayed by acclaimed actress Sheeba Chaddha. Asha Ji's introduction adds a personal touch to the AI-powered matchmaking, providing a relatable conversational experience for users through Whatsapp, backed by Sheeba Chaddha's voice and persona.

See full article at MediaBrief

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Indian Matchmaking Platform Betterhalf Raises $8.5M

BUSINESS TODAY - Homegrown matrimony app Betterhalf (earlier known a Betterhalf.ai) has raised $8.5M in a Series A round led by FinSight Ventures (which had earlier invested in Bumble), Instagram Co-founder Mike Krieger, Dropbox Co-founder Arash Ferdowsi, and other marquee investors. Founded in 2017, Betterhalf claims to have grown its revenues 2x in six months and has hit $2.5M in annual revenue with 1M MAU. Before this, in May 2021, Betterhalf had raised $3M in a Pre-Series A round led by Y Combinator, S2 Capital, Quiet Capital, and angel investors like Kunal Shah (CRED Founder).

by Sohini Mitter
See full article at Business Today

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This post also appears on InternetDatingInvestments.com

Betterhalf.ai Records $2M Revenue in FY22 With 50% Quarterly Growth

APN NEWS - Being India's first AI-driven app, Betterhalf.ai records 75K new users every month and predicts to generate $3M revenue by the end of FY23. The app has recorded $2M annualized revenue in FY22 with 50% quarterly growth. Apart from the record high revenue growth, the app has also grown its team by 250%, adding 75 full-time employees in 6 months.

See full article at APN News

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How This Startup Is Helping Corporate Hustlers Find Partners With AI-enabled Matrimony App

YOUR STORY - AI-enabled matrimony startup Betterhalf.ai's app helps the urban Indian population find potential life partners. Pawan Gupta, CEO and Co-founder of Betterhalf.ai, says that it is the fourth-largest matrimony app in India. The Y-combinator-backed app was initially founded as a digital platform for matchmakers to connect and exchange information about people looking for potential partners. Headquartered in Bengaluru, Betterhalf uses AI analytics to match potential partners on factors such as emotional, social, intellectual, moral values, and physical traits. Betterhalf runs on a subscription model. The company made a revenue of Rs 5.5 crore ($700K) in 2021, growing ~300% from 2020 when it earned $180K). Betterhalf.ai raised ~$3M in its Pre-Series A round in May 2021 from VC firms and individual investors.

by Trisha Medhi
See full article at Your Story

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Betterhalf.ai to Offer Human Matchmaking Service

INDIANWEB2 - Betterhalf.ai, Indian matrimony app, is adding a feature through which users can hire a Human Matchmaker through the app. The matchmaker would be personally involved throughout the process and will help the users with handpicked profile shortlisting and personalised partner search.

See full article at IndianWeb2

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Betterhalf.ai Records Monthly Revenue of $75K from $7.5K in 9 Months

LIVEMINT - July 3 - Betterhalf.ai operates on a subscription-based matrimony-focused platform. The app uses AI to help users find relevant matches. Betterhalf.ai is currently used by ~50K users between the age group of 25 to 35 years on a daily basis. The app has a total of 700K users with 6 to 7 times/day app visits by a single user. In addition, the user monthly activity on the app has grown from 20K MAU to 150K MAU and growth in revenue from $10K to $75K.

See full article at Livemint

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Y Combinator-backed Matchmaking Startup Betterhalf.ai Raises $3M

YOUR STORY - May 26 - BetterHalf.ai, the AI-driven matrimonial app, has raised $3M in a pre-Series A round. The startup will use the funding to boost its app engagement, build monetisation features, and product discovery across organic channels, it said in a statement. Earlier, Betterhalf.ai had raised a $2.3M seed round from Y Combinator, Tribe Capital, Nurture Ventures, and Saurabh Garg (Founder/CBO, NoBroker) and Shailesh Rao (Ex-MD of Google India, former Partner, TPG Capital). Founded in 2016 by MIT graduate Rahul Namdev and serial entrepreneur Pawan Gupta, the AI platform uses predictive analysis to help professionals find a match through compatibility scores based on relationship dimensions and their interactions on the product.

by Sindhu Kashyaap
See full article at Your Story

See the top news on Betterhalf.ai

This post also appears on InternetDatingInvestments.com

IDEA WOW + IDEA SUMMIT, in Chennai, India

OPW - Apr 9 - The Internet Dating Excellence Association World Officers Weekend happened over the weekend, and the IDEA SUMMIT happened Monday. Here's video summaries of our adventures in Chennai.

Day 1

Day 2

IDEA SUMMIT was a closed door event. It was a very full day of learning and sharing. 14 presentations were made by the CEO/Founder of Matrimony, CEO of Mamba, Chief Mobile Officer of Matrimony, CEO/Founder of Lunch Actually, CMO of Woo, CEO/Founder of Agape Match, CEO of LoveMe, MD of Insparx, Owner of SuccessfulMatch, Owner of Hubpeople, Co-founder of LoveMe, MD of Mamba, and CEO of BetterHalf.ai.

You can see the full information and line up here. Now we're working on the next event.

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Local Indian Dating Sites Focus on Serious Relationships to Take on Tinder

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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AI-Powered Dating App Betterhalf.AI Helps Users Find the Perfect Life Partner

ANALYTICS INDIA MAGAZINE - Feb 10 - Two MIT alumni, Pawan Gupta and Rahul Namdev started Betterhalf.AI in 2016. Betterhalf.AI dating app uses artificial intelligence for professionals to find each other through compatibility scores based on multiple relationship dimensions and their interactions on the product. Currently, Betterhalf.AI has ~17k users, 30% are entrepreneurs, fashion designers, scientists and bankers. The profiles are authenticated through six levels of verification that includes LinkedIn, Facebook, personal email, phone number, work email, and a Government ID. Compatibility scores are calculated based on six-relationship dimensions: emotional, social, intellectual, relationship, physical, and moral values.

by Harshajit Sarmah
See full article at Analytics India Magazine

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Millennials in India Are Turning to Algorithms to Find Their Match

BLOOMBERG - Jan 24 - Pawan Gupta wasn't having any luck finding a match so he teamed up with engineer Rahul Namdev to start an AI-powered matchmaking app, called Betterhalf.AI. The dating app, funded by 15 angel investors including half a dozen MIT alumni, puts users through several levels of verification comprising social networks, phone number, personal and work e-mail, and government ID. New users answer a breadth of questions on moral values, emotions and personality. That information is then melded with data from married individuals, open-source data and compatibility research. Betterhalf is targeted solely at people looking for a serious relationship. The start-up has 15 employees. There's plenty of competition in the new AI space including Truematch. Matrimony.com, which has 3.7M active users, is developing an AI-powered chatbot that it plans to deploy later this year.

by Saritha Rai
See full article at Bloomberg

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Dating Startup Betterhalf.AI Raises $500K In Seed Funding

ANALYTICS INDIA MAGAZINE - Oct 11 - AI-based dating startup raised $500K in a seed funding round. The investors included former MD of Google India Shailesh Rao, former investment director of Flipkart Rehan A Khan along with other senior investors. The startup has already raised ~$750K till now. Founded in 2016, by two MIT alumni, Pawan Gupta and Rahul Namdev, Betterhalf.AI uses artificial intelligence to find matches through compatibility scores based on multiple relationship dimensions and their interactions on the product.

by Prajakta Hebbar
See full article at Analytics India Magazine

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This post also appears on InternetDatingInvestments.

Summarized by the IDEA team