The Week in Dating Business: September 22 to October 1, 2026
Match bets on intent, Blackstone keeps selling Bumble, and governments on three continents move into dating safety and matchmaking.
Two stories about the incumbents and three about governments. Match relaunched Upward for marriage-minded singles and put a date on Tinder's recovery, while Bumble's largest outside shareholder kept selling, at its lowest price yet. In Washington, Congress sent a romance-scam warning law to the President. Australia moved dating apps into a proposed digital duty of care, and Singapore went further and built its own verified dating service for civil servants. Elsewhere, a former Tinder executive raised $10.5 million to put people back in matchmaking, and Once, the original slow-dating app, stopped calling itself a dating app at all.
M&A
AnalysisM&ABlackstone Keeps Selling Bumble, Now at Its Lowest Price Yet
Blackstone sold about 4.8 million more Bumble shares on September 28 at roughly $2.94, its third quarterly sale this year and the lowest price yet.
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Platforms
AnalysisPlatformsMatch Is Selling Intent Now. Its Numbers Say It Has To.
Match relaunched Upward for marriage-minded singles while telling investors Tinder won't stop shrinking until late 2027.
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Policy
AnalysisPolicyAustralia Is Turning Dating Safety Into a Legal Duty. Here Is What It Costs.
Dating apps will need annual written risk assessments under Australia's proposed digital duty of care. What it costs operators, and why it won't stay local.
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PolicyCongress Passes the Romance Scam Prevention Act
Dating apps will have to warn users when someone they messaged is banned for fraud. Platforms get a year to comply once it's signed.
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PolicySingapore's Government Launches Its Own Dating Service for Civil Servants
Singapore's GovTech launched FirstDate, a Singpass-verified dating pilot for public officers aged 21 to 35 that delivers one match per cycle.
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Funding
FundingEx-Tinder Executive's Rivet Raises $10.5 Million to Put People Back in Matchmaking
Former Tinder executive Taru Kapoor launched Rivet across the U.S. with a $10.5 million seed round and a crowd-sourced matching model.
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Product
ProductOnce Stops Being a Dating App
The app built on one curated match a day now sells chat, charging in-app currency to keep talking, even to paying subscribers.
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High Intent operates consumer dating brands and a white-label dating platform that compete with some companies covered here.