Dating website PlentyOfFish is joining up with Los Angeles-based dating service Tinder, over at Tinder’s parent company-The Match Group-after IAC said it would pay $575M in cash for PlentyOfFish this morning. Its roster now includes Match.com, Tinder, and OkCupid.
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A dating website started in a Vancouver apartment twelve years ago has been sold for nearly three-quarters of a billion Canadian dollars in cash. PlentyOfFish has around 75 employees. Match Group is also planning an IPO around the same time as the closing of the PlentyOfFish deal. “As more people than ever use more dating apps than ever with more frequency than ever, PlentyOfFish’s addition both brings new members into our family of products and deepens the lifetime relationship we have with our users across our portfolio”.
And that portfolio is impressive.
PlentyOfFish will add its 90 million registered users and 3.6 million active daily users to that pool.
Match.com, IAC’s first matchmaking service, was launched in 1995.
The Match Group said the deal is subject to approval from Canada’s federal industry minister and is expected to close early in the fourth quarter.
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Last week saw the United Kingdom launch of Coffee Meets Bagel, a dating app that sends users one potential match every day at noon, while an app called AirDates, which aims to connect travellers looking for love, recently debuted in London. The Match Group is a subsidiary of IAC (NASDAQ:IACI) and has over 50 brands in 200 countries around the world. ‘My team and I have grown PlentyOfFish into one of the leaders in our category, and I am confident that Match will help accelerate our growth even further.’. The organization has consistently declined to comment on the report.
