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Bumble founder and CEO Whitney Wolfe Herd became the youngest self-made billionaire in the world this week after the shares of the dating app company skyrocketed during its initial public offering.
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| Ticker | Safety | Last | Change | Change % |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| BMBL | BUMBLE INC | 78.51 | +8.20 | + 11.66% |
The 31-year-old player’s net worth reached $ 1.5 billion on Thursday, according to Forbes, after Bumble’s shares closed at $ 70.31 per share during its first day on the public market.
At 1 pm, Wolfe Herd’s nearly 12% stake in the company was worth $ 1.6 billion, the channel reported. It owns 21.54 million shares in the company, which has a market capitalization of $ 8 billion.
The $ 1.6 billion mark is a far cry from its previous net worth of around $ 575 million, according to previous Forbes estimates.
In addition to her newly acquired billionaire status, Wolfe Herd is also the youngest chief executive to go public in a company in the United States, according to the vehicle.
WHO STARTED BUMBLE?
Bumble founder Whitney Wolfe Herd on October 25, 2018 in New York City. (Bennett Raglin photo / Getty Images for Fast Company)
Wolfe Herd co-founded the company about seven years ago to reinvent the structure of the dating app. The app, unlike its competitors, gives women the ability to “control the conversation”.
It has been dubbed by some as a Sadie Hawkins-style dating app. Most notably, it has also become one of America’s fastest growing dating apps since it hit the app store, Forbes reported.
The company’s success placed her on the Forbes list of America’s most successful women entrepreneurs and executives in 2020. She is also a 30 and a half-year-old honoree.
However, his journey on the digital dating scene did not start with Bumble. In fact, before she started at the multi-billion dollar company, she co-founded her biggest competitor: Tinder.
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In 2012, after graduating from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Wolfe Herd co-founded and became vice president of marketing for Tinder, according to his LinkedIn account.
However, Wolfe Herd left Tinder and filed a lawsuit against the company, alleging sexual harassment. Tinder denied any wrongdoing and the lawsuit was finally closed, Forbes said.
Shortly thereafter, in 2014, she founded Bumble, which originally intended to be a “female social platform” instead of a dating app, with the help of Andrey Andreev. Andreev is a London-based entrepreneur who created the dating app Badoo in 2006, Forbes reported.
In 2016, Bumble, which is still the only dating app where women take the first step, expanded their social network with Bumble For Friends to help people establish friendships. A year later, the company developed Bumble Bizz, aimed at professional networking.
Bumble also owns the Badoo dating app. Together, the applications are used in 150 countries with tens of millions of monthly subscribers, Forbes reported.
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