Bumble in Advanced Talks to Go Private at $1 Billion, a 93% Collapse from Peak

Bumble, the dating app founded by Whitney Wolfe Herd on the premise that women make the first move, is in advanced talks to be taken private at a valuation of roughly $1 billion — a stunning fall from the $14 billion-plus peak it hit after its 2021 IPO. As of last Friday, the company's public market cap sat at just $335 million, meaning shares have shed over 90% of their value in roughly five years.

The buyer is Ithaca Holdings, a newly formed firm co-founded by Ravi Gupta — a Sequoia Capital partner and former Instacart CFO — and John Hegeman, most recently Meta's chief revenue officer. Ithaca's stated mission is applying frontier technology, including AI, to build consumer products, and Bumble would be one of its first major acquisitions. A deal could close as soon as this week.

Wolfe Herd, who originally co-founded Tinder before launching Bumble in 2014, is expected to roll at least a portion of her equity stake into the new private structure and remain involved with the company. Early backer Blackstone, which took a majority stake in 2019 and still holds roughly 14% following the IPO, would be selling out of a position that has dramatically declined in value.

Bumble's deterioration mirrors broader pain across the online dating industry. Younger users are increasingly souring on dating apps, and Bumble has been hit hard — both its flagship Bumble app and its secondary app Badoo reported revenue declines. The company brought Wolfe Herd back as CEO in 2025, and within months she oversaw layoffs of roughly 30% of staff. In August, Bumble quietly abandoned its signature women-first messaging feature — the very product differentiator that defined the brand. Rival Match Group has fared somewhat better, with Hinge growth partially offsetting stagnation at Tinder, but the whole sector is leaning hard into AI integrations as a lifeline.