Hi everyone, I'm Emily Chang and this is Bloomberg Studio, one point out. In her early twenties, Whitney wolf Heard became tech famous as a co founder of Tinder, where users wipe right if they like what they see and left if they don't. But she left it a controversy, suing her Tinder colleagues for sexual harassment and discrimination. That case settled out of the public eye, but herds mission to upend dating norms through technology was just getting started.
She threw her efforts into Bumble, a dating app where women make the first move. Bumble now has a hundred million users in a hundred fifty countries, and Wall Street is a buzz with chatter about Bumble's road to I p O joining me now on Bloomberg Studio. At one point, Oh Bumble CEO and co founder Whitney wolf Heard whinny, the pandemic has upended everything about normal life, and one might assume that the dating world came to a stands
still at the start of this. What happened if you were single and looking for love in the time of coronavirus or maybe just some fun. So this pandemic has completely changed everything about our lives. But what has been reinforced is the importance of relationships and the importance of
human connection. Uh Loneliness has also been at an all time high given the way our lives have been completely UH change, and the importance of having relationships and finding companionship and even finding love has only become more and more critical in this time. And so, you know, like any business owner in any business UM team across the world, the first few weeks for very Um Touch and Go, we didn't know what was going to happen because of
this pandemic. We didn't know if this was going to be catastrophic for business or if there could be some silver lining, and we're very, very fortunate that it's the latter. So what we've seen is the durability of the need to date and the durability of digital dating. What it activity did you see on the platform given that people couldn't see each other in person? Did it just stop or did it spike? It spiked The activity on our product,
starting at the lockdowns, really started to go up. And what was fascinating was more than activity rising, was the use of our video dating. And so it's important to note that we introduced video chats and video messaging and video dating well before this pandemic really started. We introduced this in and the usage of it was not very vast, it was actually quite measured, and all of a sudden, with this pandemic hitting, the video chats went through the roof.
And not only did they go through the roof from a from a use case standpoint, but from a time spent video chatting, and something really amazing happened out of this. We really started to realize that people are getting to
know each other on a deeper level. They're getting to know each other more authentically, more thoroughly, and then they're able to evaluate coming off of these video chats if the person on the other end is in fact someone they want to meet, and so categorically this has changed how digital dating works for the long run. What makes Bumble unique is that you let women make the first move only with men that they are matched with, or if we're talking about same sex folks, either person can
make the first move. For so long, dating has always told men to go first, has always told women to wait, and by doing this we've completely created an imbalance in gender or equity when it comes to relationships. And so if we're talking about a heterosexual relationship and you're telling women never to make the first move and to sit and to wait, and you're asking men to always go first, you're creating this situation where men are led to be rejected.
When they're rejected and hide behind a profile screen, a lot of bad things can happen, like aggression, harassment, abuse, and other forms of toxic behavior, and so it really creates this imbalance. But what Bumble has done is entirely flipped the switch. So on Bumble, every time a woman connects with a man, if she's looking for a man on the product or a mail on the product, she always has to start the conversation. She always must start,
and it must always say hello first. And this has completely turned it on its head in the sense that rejection is eliminated, pressure has been taken away, empowerment has been infused, and control has been given to the woman. And so this really does change the entire dynamics start to end. You also do a ton of user research.
What are you hearing from users about what they want more of, what they want less of, and how do you meet those demands Customers Over the years have shown us that they want more than love, they want more than romance. They actually started hacking our product to find friends, to find business connections, to find platonic connection, and so then we built these modes for them. And so now Bumble is a full fledged social connection platform for people
you don't know yet, ranging well beyond love. It's you know, extends into platonic friendships, business relationships, and and so much more. You now have more than a hundred million users in a hundred fifty different countries around the world. Talk to us about the growth you're seeing in places like India and Germany and Mexico. Well, I think what growth around the world tells us is that we're all not so
different after all. Right, Um, yes, we have different cultures, we have different preferences, but at the end of the day, we are all humans and we all need to connect. We all need to find love, we need to find friendship, we need to find business opportunities. So we're seeing huge growth in places like Mexico, Germany, even in Israel, we're
seeing early high growth. And so when we plant our seeds places, due to the nature of our product, which is infused with empowerment and giving control to women and really the wider use case of just you know, finding connection. This works around the world. So how does women making the first move play out in a place like India where, you know, even more so than in the United States, women are not empowered to break down cultural barriers like that.
It's really truly been one of the greatest joys of my career to go into places that are historically not engineered to grant women power or to um give them, you know, um any encouragement to go after what they want their relationships and to go in with with the product which is ours bumble, and to actually give them a different way. So it's not that women around the world don't want to make the first move. It's not that women in India don't want to be treated as
equals or given control over the relationships. So that the society in the system hasn't hasn't um you know, granted that opportunity, and so when you introduce another way women and will thrive. Now in terms of the product, I know, there have been some new features like letting women send an introductory emojis so you can sort of put feelers out there, um because you can't meet someone in person. You can't, you know, monitor things like body language and
get signals from that. You know, talk to us about some of the new features that you've implemented at this unprecedented time. We've done quite a few things. We have given data as the opportunity to put badges on their profile, which indicates what they're willing to do during this time, if they want a socially distance date, or if they are COVID free and are willing to go on an actual date, or if they are just interested in virtual dating.
At this time, there's so much talk about what new normal will look like when we come out of this, if we come out of this. As we come out of this, you know, some of us may never go back to the office. For example. Do you think things about dating will also be permanently changed. I do. I believe that there are a couple of things that will change for the better with dating. One, I believe that
we will stop taking relationships for granted. I really do believe that we as people recognize, maybe long overdue, but we fully recognize the importance of companionship and healthy, equitable relationships. Secondarily, I think that on bumble we are going to see the lasting impacts in a long term. UM kind of
feature to stay will be video dating. I really do believe, coming off the data we've seen and that the anecdotal feedback we've heard, that women truly feel safer and more encouraged and more willing to meet someone in real life if they've gotten to know them virtually, so instead of just matching with someone, connecting with them, chatting with them, and then going to the coffee shop, which is what was taking place pre covid, I do believe there's going
to be added layers of friction before where you meet in real life, which candidly is exceptional for the sake of safety and making sure that connections are valid and and you know, really authentic and true. This is my conversation with Whitney Wolf heard Bumble CEO and co founder up next, how the sexual harassment and discrimination lawsuit against her former colleagues at Tinder has shaped her leadership at Bumble and progress on her contributions to a Texas law
cracking down on online harassment. I'm Emily Chang, this is Bloomberg Studio. At one point, oh, I want to learn a little bit more about young Whitney, because there are so many little girls out there who need to be inspired by stories like yours. When you were a kid, did you think you could be an entrepreneur or a founder or a CEO? What kind kid for you? When I was young, you know, I didn't have a lot of women's CEOs or woman founder examples to look to.
You know, I think a lot of us experience that growing up, and and so it was never something in my mind. So I never thought that I would be a businesswoman per se. But I always had a creative streak in me, and I always had an entrepreneurial streak in me. But you know, I don't think we knew that we had permission to go there so far to the point where it was almost mocked to some degree, and so um. You know, I think the beauty of
where we are today is that's changing. You know, women that are starting their careers and starting businesses are are are our sources of inspiration to young girls. You went to Southern Methodist University, as I understand it, you started your first business in college, actually selling tope bags, with the proceeds going to the area's hardest hit by the deep water Horizon oil spill, and when you graduated, you worked in orphanages across Asia. Your resume reads more like
a resume for a saint than a CEO. Well, certainly not a saint, I can tell you that much. But you know what is interesting about that is, had I not had those experiences, Bumble would not be what Bumble is today. And I think what what we're trying to accomplish a Bumble is that you can drive profit and purpose and they can coincide, they can coexist, and in fact,
they fuel one another. And I think what's really interesting is if you look at every major social media platform prior to Bumble, not one of them had been engineered truly with women in mind, whether that was being able to send a photo that might disappear, or being able to, you know, decide who was attractive on campus or not.
I don't want to name names, but I think you can understand where I'm going with this in the sense that there had really never been a major social media platform or connection platform the design for a woman's experience. And so when I was starting Bumble, it was so important to me to really rewrite the code for the woman experience, start to end, How do we protect her, how do we keep her safe? How do we empower her? How do we inspire her? How do we give her
what she wants and needs? So before Bumble was Tinder, where you were a co founder and they were trying to rewrite the code but in a different direction, and swiping left and right is still a completely different approach.
What did you learn there and from that experience? So my time of being a co founder at Tinder was incredibly informative, and I'm forever grateful for the experience and exposure I had to high growth tech business early on UM and from my time there, I really identified white space. You know, I can't tell you how hard the first few years of Bumble were. I mean, UM, I was mocked and laughed at and told I was crazy and
that it would never work. And we were told that, you know, women won't make the for us move, They shouldn't make the first move, they don't make the first move. And here we are, UM one point five billion first moves and counting five and a half six years later, and it's it's really um. It's a testament to all
women out there. If you, if you identify an issue that women experience, and you set out to solve that for women, Um, they will come and they will follow because we need the solutions and and it's a huge opportunity for all women building businesses. You've been quite candid about your own experience being being bullied. You also, in a big first move, sued your former team at Tinder
for discrimination and sexual harassment. How did that inform how you want to lead and how you want to do things differently at Bumble After my departure from Tinder, Uh, that became very public my departure, in the details of my departure were displayed all over the Internet, and with that came flew of online abuse and harassment from complete strangers.
But it never ended. It would go in the night and the daytime, and my social media accounts were flooded with really toxic, toxic and mean words and you know, words count, and it hurt me. It devastated me, and it sent me into a really dark place. And and from that I had an opportunity to say, Okay, this can either destroy me and this is the end of my career, or I can really put a pin in
what's wrong here and try to build a solution. And so that was really the beginning of my journey onward into my next chapter, which has become Bumble, which was why is social media so unaccountable? Why is social media so cruel? Why are we allowed to treat each other this way online when frankly, those same people sending those messages if they saw me in a grocer, you store or on the street, I can guess that they wouldn't say those things to me because there would be some
level of accountability. And so that was really the beginning of of of flipping the switch, and my my lesson through that has been too really make that our north star. How do we engineer healthy and equitable relationships for everyone? And that starts with also how we treat each other internally as a team. And so it's just been very foundational and something we've stayed very very loyal to. Someone says something about you online or comments on the way
you look that can have a big impact on someone. Um, you know what about the role of online dating in that, because that can also play a pretty powerful role. What are you doing to address the negative or potential negative mental and emotional impacts of that. You're absolutely right, first and foremost we've really laid down the law internally and from a product standpoint on what we will tolerate and
what we will not. We have a zero tolerance policy for hate, for bad behavior, for toxicity, for any discrimination of any kind. We will block you, we will report you, and we will involve the police if if it is consequential, if if you do something that is dangerous. Um. Not only that, but we've really built product features to support this. So we were the first group to roll out photo verification. Photo verification is an opportunity to validate and verify who
you are in under one minute. Um. The fact that online dating is a place where you can be anonymous or you can pretend to be someone else is very scary, and so we really take this very seriously and we make sure that that's not happening and that we're doing all we can to prevent it. You've contributed to a Texas law actually cracking down on digital sexual harassment. Tell me how much progress you've made there. We introduced a bill to solve for the issue of no online accountability
and no regulation on really toxic, scary digital behavior. So in the real world, you have indecent exposure. This is a law. There are consequences if you expose yourself in public in front of others in any unsolicited format. It's a very serious law, and there are very serious consequences.
Yet you could stand on the same block in front of the same strangers and you could air drop a photo of yourself and there are no consequences, not until the law that we had passed, and we introduced this bill to ban or to make illegal, the sending of unsolicited lewed photos. This bill was introduced as a law, the law passed unanimously in the Texas State Senate, which we all know in such a polarizing political climate it's very hard to do. So that's just to suggest the
serious nature of this. This is a human issue, This is not a political issue. And we were able to get that law actually signed into effect, and so now in the state of Texas, it is illegal to send unsolicited lewd photos. And that is just the first of many laws and bills that we hope to advocate for in the coming years. So, speaking of politics, we've been through an incredibly volatile political time. How are you addressing
politics and dating? We stay really loyal to our mission, and if our mission is to engineer a world, or to create a world where all relationships are healthy and equitable. Well, then there are certain things we cannot tolerate. There are certain things we have to stand up for. We must protect a woman's right to choose. We must protect a woman's right to her own body and her choices, and we must protect the right to love whoever you want to love, no matter what. And we must really take
a hard stance against any form of discrimination. And so that is the firm line we draw on the sand. We do not tell you who you can and cannot vote for, but we do tell you what we will and will not tolerate as a business. And so that's really been our northern star. You're listening to my conversation with Bumble CEO and co founder Whitney wolf Hurt. Coming up with a swarm of dating apps and social media
platforms out there, how does Bumble compete? And in a year of big tchech I p O, when will the company go public? I'm Emily Chang. This is Bloomberg Studio at one point out stay with us. As of last year, the private equity firm Blackstone now has a majority stake in bumble. What kind of resources and access has that afforded you to take advantage and scale Our partnership with
black Stone is absolutely incredible. I have so much respect and admiration for the team there, for their leadership, for their incredible support and championing of us, both as a team and as a business. UM. It has really been the highlight of my entire career to work with Blackstone UM.
It has been a remarkable success story from a private equity and high growth tech business standpoint, and there's not so many of those UM, so it was a bit of a of a unique UM match, but it has been absolutely sensational and they have really given us UM a wide range of resources and support, ranging from helping us scale our talent, to placing our board, to helping us dig deeper into data analytics and really double doubling down on privacy and security and you know coming in
and really helping us just really further accelerate the business from every every side. UM and I have a great partnership with with the folks over there, and has just been it has really been a remarkable opportunity. There's been talk about an I p O a six to eight billion dollar I p O. Does black Stones involvement now
change the path forward? So I cannot comment on the future prospect of a potential I p O. But I can tell you that we are working hand in hand every day black Stone and Bumble to pursue UM the best future outcome for the business. And we love our partnership and we stay very close UM on all future potential opportunities where a high growth business, and so we're exploring all options now. Tender, along with all the other
dating apps, is now your competition. So why should people use Bumble when there are now Pick your Flavor, Coffee Meats, Bagel, Hinge, the League, all of these other options out there. We fundamentally believe that the way a relationship starts is very um suggestive of how it will end, and we're really trying to recalibrate the way relationships begin so they can
become more healthy, more equitable, more long lasting. And when a woman makes the first move, she really establishes control and has um you know, an equal footing from the very first hello. And that's what we really fundamentally believe sets us apart from a product standpoint. Even if you
saw the same person on five products on Bumble. Saying hello first changes the course of the way that relationship will go and the way that conversation will go, and it really does just promote more healthy and equitable relationships for all. Any dating app has the problem that once you create a successful match, those people don't need the app anymore, certainly don't need to pay a subscribe ship. How do you reconcile that and keep making money? That
is an issue for certain dating apps. But we are not just a dating app. We offer so many other verticals inside our product, and we see that our users and our customers really come for more than just dating. We have a large sector of our user base that comes and uses all three modes, which is dating, friend finding, and business opportunities. Does that mean then you're competing with Instagram and Facebook and TikTok and snapchat? And how do
you compete? What's really interesting about the Instagrams and the facebooks and the snapchats of the world. You're communicating with your friends. That is the place you are keeping in touch with the network you already have. You are commenting on friends photos and exchanging um updates with one another. Bumble connects you to people you don't know yet. So Bumble is really what comes before social media. This is what is giving you a network. This is what is
expanding your opportunities of who you know. This is introducing you to new people, and then down the road you can engage with those folks on other social media platforms. So Facebook is two people you know, Bumble is two people you don't. All right, Whitney Wolf heard, founder and CEO of Bumble. Thank you so much, Whitney for taking the time to join us. Great to have you here Bloombrook Studio at one point. I was produced and edited
by Kevin Hines. Our executive producer is Alison Weiss. Our managing editor is Danielle Culpritson, with production assistance from Mallory Abelhausen. I'm Emily Chang, your host and executive producer. This is Bloomberg