Grindr, the leading dating app for gay and bisexual men, is preparing to list its shares on international stock exchanges. The app’s Chinese parent company, Kunlun Group, said in a stock exchange filing to the China Securities Regulatory Commission that the listing will take place overseas at an unspecified time. The timing and locations of the share sale will be determined by regulatory approval as well as capital market conditions.

In the Shenzhen stock exchange filing, Kunlun Group said that financing arrangements would be made to support Grindr’s expansion following the completion of the IPO. The company’s board said that going public would “strengthen” Grindr’s competitiveness and support future development plans for the business.

“Grindr’s listing won’t exert a huge influence on the group’s revenues and profits,” Kunlun said in the filing, according to The Independent. “Meanwhile, Grindr can have an individual and direct financing platform which can support its expansion and long-term development.”

Sean Rad, Tinder co-Founder and former CEO, claims in a lawsuit that he was forced to sell his shares of Tinder stock by parent company IAC (now Match Group) under pressure of being fired. Because of this, he and other Tinder employees potentially lost millions of dollars through an alleged stock devaluation.

According to an article in The Verge, Rad says he was forced into exercising his options early, about a month before he was fired in September 2017. He says he felt pressured to sell because those options would expire after he left the company, and he suspected Match Group of planning his ouster. As it turns out, Match Group did fire him a month later, even though it wasn’t publicized at the time.

Image: CoffeeMeetsBagel

Dating App Coffee Meets Bagel no longer requires a Facebook account for users to login to the app. Now, customers can sign up using their mobile number instead, bypassing Facebook completely.

The change was effective on August 20^th.

Typically when customers sign up to a new online dating platform, they have to verify that they are a real person (to avoid the proliferation of fake accounts). Facebook has typically been part of this verification process, and provides an easy way for users to pull photos, profile information, and link personal connections with other networks of friends.

Popular dating app Bumble has decided to nix mixing business with pleasure. It will now enable users of Bumble Bizz and BFF to search for new relationships outside of dating by turning off the app’s dating mode.

Bumble Bizz, the networking platform to help people find new business opportunities, and Bumble BFF, which helps people connect with others seeking friendships, were both launched in 2017. However, they were connected to the original Bumble dating app, so if you were looking for a job or a friend, you also shared your profile with potential dates. This wasn’t ideal for those who were only looking for platonic connections.

Now that Bumble has officially separated these areas, they are looking to expand their user base beyond singles.

I have just been reviewing the different statistics for the popular dating services and I found that OkCupid still does list a few live statistics on their About page. I was originally going to write this post in July but I just got too it now. One surprising thing I notice was in July they had listed 57 employees but now only 54 are listed. All the other statistics have stayed pretty much the same. They still list 1 million plus OkCupid apps installed per week and 7.3 million messages sent a day (I assume this is the website and apps combined). These 2 stats are the same since the last time I checked in 2016.

OkCupid also list in real-time the number of people online using their service at any given time. This number changes constantly and is lower in the early morning and higher in the evening. It is also higher on the weekends when compared to during the week. The average number after taking several samples is about 100,000 people online.

For More information on this dating service you can read our OkCupid review and check out our complete OkCupid statistics page.

It is another long weekend which means eHarmony has a good promotion on. 😁

Starting Wednesday August 29^th till the evening on Sunday September 2^nd, 2018 eHarmony is offering 50% off a 3 month subscription. This is a savings of just over $75 (3 month plan regular price is $155.70). A 3 month subscription is eHarmony's most popular option. A coupon code is required to receive the discount. It is:

Code: JOIN

New and existing eHarmony users (who do not have a subscription already) can take advantage of this discount. All you need is an eHarmony members account. Once you have logged into eHarmony, I would then recommend taking the personality questionnaire. When it is completed (takes 30 mins on average) you will be sent your first batch of matches. I would then review those matches to see if one or more members spark your interest. If any do, I would then suggest the upgraded membership.

Like with other subscription dating services, only upgraded members can communicate with each other. This is why these type of promotions are so popular, especially on holiday weekends when more people have time to try out an online dating service.

For more about this dating service, please check out our eHarmony review.