A $1.3 billion match for Bumble (Picture: Reuters)
The dating app has agreed to be acquired by Ithaca Holdings in a $1.3 billion deal, and Ithaca co-founders Ravi Gupta and John Hegeman will become Bumble’s co-CEOs once it closes. Founder Whitney Wolfe Herd, who started the app 12 years ago, will stay actively involved, though her exact role hasn’t been spelled out. Bumble is going private.
Since Wolfe Herd returned as CEO in March 2025, it has added AI help for profiles and messages, started testing an AI matchmaking assistant and introduced Plans in July, which nudges users towards real-world meetups. Rival Match Group, which owns Tinder and Hinge, has also slumped from its 2021 highs, but Hinge keeps pulling in people after serious relationships. Bumble was already moving that way. In August, it scrapped the rule that only women could message first, the very feature that built the brand. Wolfe Herd has also teased a new way to interact that could eventually replace swiping. Away from public markets, Bumble now gets time to prove it can win those daters back. You use AI every day. Now get your AI Quotient. Take the AIQ test.
Ithaca is paying $6.05 per share, a 122.4% premium to Bumble’s closing price on June 24, the day before reports emerged that the company was exploring a sale. The stock jumped 50% on Monday as news of the deal spread and rose another 56% to $5.95 in early trading on Tuesday. Even so, Bumble was worth only about $582 million at Monday’s close, far below the roughly $14 billion valuation it fetched on its Nasdaq debut in 2021. Blackstone, which owns about 14% of Bumble, has signed off alongside her, giving the deal the shareholder approval it needs.
Investors liked what they saw. An independent committee of Bumble’s board recommended the deal after a review of strategic options, and Wolfe Herd stayed out of the discussions and the vote.
Bumble’s second-quarter revenue fell 15.2% year-on-year to $211 million, while paying users dropped 16.4% to around 3.2 million.
The pair described the acquisition as “a bet on the future of humanity”, with Ithaca focused on building businesses for a world reshaped by AI. The reasons for selling are in the numbers. Revenue has been sliding for close to two years, and the company has turned an annual pre-tax profit only once since going public. They will be the first men to lead the women-first app since it listed.
Last year, it cut nearly a third of its workforce. Gupta held C-suite roles at Instacart before becoming a partner at Sequoia, and Hegeman was previously Meta’s chief revenue officer.