Vancouver’s PlentyOfFish Acquired by Match for US $575 Million

The Match Group, the global operator of digital dating products such as Match, Tinder, OkCupid and Meetic, and a subsidiary of IAC announced today that it has entered into a definitive agreement to purchase PlentyOfFish for US $575 million in cash.

PlentyOfFish announced earlier this year that it had surpassed 100 million users worldwide, putting its current annual run rate at $100 million. The “world’s largest dating site” said most new growth had come from mobile with 80% of members’ usage now via a mobile device.

“For over a decade I have followed the consistent growth of PlentyOfFish, first within North America, then globally, and most recently across platforms, as one of the most popular mobile dating products in the world,” said Sam Yagan, CEO of The Match Group.

“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.  I look forward to working closely with Markus and extending the company’s impressive growth trajectory.”

“We are thrilled to be joining forces with Match,” said Markus Frind, CEO of PlentyOfFish. “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 transaction is expected to close early in the fourth quarter and is subject to the receipt of the approval from the Minister of Industry pursuant to the Investment Canada Act. 

Founded in 2003, Frind was the only employee of his company until he hired a developer in 2009 when the site reached more than two billion pageviews per month. “Somehow I managed to create the largest dating site in the world without a single employee and [still] travel the world,” Frind blogged.

Nine years ago Frind famously posted online a $900,000 cheque from Google for two months of Adsense revenue. Last year he revealed his Adsense earnings leading up to that major milestone—right from June 2003, when he earned just $7.60 for a paltry 463 pageviews.