Bumble Inc.

Bumble Inc., headquartered in Austin, Texas, is a holding company that owns Bumble, Badoo, and BFF,[3] all of which are online dating and social networking apps.

History

The company was founded as MagicLab by Andrey Andreev and launched Badoo in 2006.[4][5]

In 2014, Whitney Wolfe Herd founded Bumble shortly after leaving Tinder, where she was a co-founder and VP of Marketing. Badoo co-founder and CEO Andrey Andreev encouraged her to start a new dating app and brought her on as a partner in MagicLab. Andreev retained 79% ownership in the company for an investment of $10 million, along with additional investments, consulting services, and use of Badoo's infrastructure; Wolfe Herd served as CEO and received a 20% ownership stake.[6][7][8][5][9][10]

The Bumble app was launched in December 2014.[11]

The company was valued at more than $1 billion in November 2017.[5]

In 2017, UK-based gay dating app Chappy was funded primarily by Bumble and Wolfe Herd.[12] The app closed down in February 2020.[13]

In 2019, Blackstone Inc. purchased a majority stake in MagicLab at a valuation of the company of $3 billion.[14]

In 2020, MagicLab was renamed Bumble Inc.[15]

In February 2021, the company became a public company via an initial public offering on the Nasdaq, raising $2.2 billion with a valuation of over $7 billion.[16][17][18][19]

In February 2022, in its first acquisition, Bumble acquired Fruitz, a France-based freemium dating app popular with Generation Z in Europe.[20] In May 2023, Bumble acquired Official, an app that helped couples strengthen their relationship through mood check-ins and date planning.[21]

In February 2024, Bumble announced layoffs of 350 employees, 30% of its workforce, as part of a restructuring plan.[22][23]

In June 2024, Bumble acquired Geneva, a friend-finding group chat app.[24][25]

In January 2024, Wolfe Herd moved to executive chair of the company and hired Lidiane Jones as the Bumble Inc. CEO.[26][27] One year later, in January 2025, Wolfe Herd announced that she would be returning as CEO in March 2025.[28]

In June 2025, Bumble announced layoffs of 240 positions, or 30% of its workforce in a cost cutting measure that is assumed to save Bumble $40 million annually.[29][30][31][32][33]