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Bumble’s new CEO talks about her key mission: diversifying the company

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Since the Bumble hit IPO at the height of the pandemic, investor enthusiasm for the dating site has cooled. At least Bumble stock is currently trading at around $11 per share, a far cry from the $76 it reached on its first day as a public company in February 2021.

Investors are, after all, fickle, which is a challenge for nearly every publicly traded company. The greater concern for Bumble is user fatigue. People aren’t downloading dating apps as enthusiastically as they once were, which suggests less subscription revenue. Younger people, especially, are wanting to use other platforms to search out love, including TikTok, and even Snapchat Discord.

Now it’s Lidiane Jones’ job to reverse these trends. This is the difficult task facing many CEOs tasked with rescuing businesses from the post-pandemic doldrums: in publishingIN retail sales and Automotive branchamongst other industries. The end result is, after all, uncertain. But Jones, who was recruited to Bumble in January from Slack — where she was also hired as chief change officer and left after just 10 months — has a game plan, as she recently explained over a din of lunchtime diners at a San Francisco restaurant.

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Some of them are related to artificial intelligence, which Bumble’s rivals are also leaning into this harder. Part of this has to do with “margin expansion.” Jones told me that lots of it’s about bringing joy back to an experience that isn’t any longer enjoyable for nearly half of the participants. Much of that conversation follows, edited for length and clarity.

Like many CEOs right away, you’ve got found yourself in a situation where you’ve got needed to lay off people almost immediately – in Bumble’s case, 30% of your 1,200 employees. That’s quite a bit to know quickly. How did you take care of it?

I had some onboarding occurring before I even began. (Bumble founder) Whitney (Wolfe Herd) was incredibly involved in my onboarding process, which put me on a quick track to learning the organization. She really supported me. I believe it made an enormous difference. I’m also deeply convinced that in case you are planning a change, be really thorough and thoughtful in order not to reveal the company to an extended, multi-stage process.

In the second quarter of this 12 months, you relaunch the Bumble app. I read that you simply are reconsider whether women should make the first movewhich looks as if an enormous change.

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Our brand awareness is so high it’s amazing. And in case you ask anyone about Bumble, they’ll say it’s about women, and the core of that does not change. We are a company that actually cares about empowering women.

But as we approach our tenth anniversary, it’s an amazing time to think about how we are able to best serve our mission. For us, it’s really about how we express women’s empowerment today and over the next 10 years. What we really need to do is move from women taking the first step to women deciding (who should take the first step). We give women more control and suppleness to decide on what is true for them.

By inviting women to make the first move, do you’re thinking that Bumble has had an impact on who uses the platform? Friends have told me that men they meet on the platform are likely to be more passive, which sometimes causes them dismay.

Historically, we have seen that lots of men who consider in women’s empowerment will come to Bumble. I’ve heard this sentiment about passivity (men) a number of times, but not that always. Our ultimate goal is definitely to offer our customers with an amazing experience.

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Other areas of interest include security and artificial intelligence. What can Bumble users expect after the relaunch?

If you’re thinking that about the development of this amazing technology in the context of dating, it is barely pretty much as good and as protected as the company’s data security and security practices. Our customers’ privacy and trust have all the time been extremely strong; we have now all the time had a high bar for healthy connections.

We’ve developed lots of AI and lots of technology over the last 10 years that actually protects in-app behavior, and we are able to tune the models to reflect our values ​​and security guidelines. But we would like to go even further. An enormous a part of Bumble’s DNA advocates for policies that make women feel protected, and we would like to be at the forefront of not only driving the great advancements in technology, but in addition advocating for policies that keep people protected online.

Bumble has long physically verified its users to make sure user profiles should not bots or scams, but doesn’t check criminal background. Will this modification with artificial intelligence?

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We check the background. We will certainly work with different (players). But for me it is a priority. I believe that is one other essential step for us.

What else should people know about the upcoming update?

This is actually the starting of a new pace of innovation for Bumble. This is the starting of a new set of experiences. We update the appearance of the profile, we update the visual language of the application, we would like to have more contact with our users, and the tone of voice must be fun and joyful. We’re taking a look at AI to assist amplify a few of the turning points in people’s lives which might be particularly concerning, like making a profile, which will be really difficult. We really have the desire to make dating fun again – that is really the most vital thing.

User fatigue is difficult to beat. Will the new application be accompanied by a new user acquisition strategy?

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Bumble has all the time been great at social marketing: organizing events and finding ambassadors who really need to represent the brand. This has been somewhat disrupted during the pandemic; we’re taking this moment before our launch to resume lots of community events because there are lots of people who find themselves looking forward to connecting in person again, and that is the place to begin.

Bumble has all the time been about greater than just dating. Dating plays an enormous role on this, but we have now all the time believed that connections and friendships are needed, so we’re increasing our investment in our capability for friendship because we consider that many individuals just want to begin by hanging out with other people.

Bumble for Friends launched last 12 months. Will we ever see you develop this as a standalone entity?

We are still collecting customer feedback. I’ve heard enthusiastic cases of each. We’re still investigating it.

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This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com
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As Musk manages his growing family: WSJ

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Elon Musk says his duty is to “make new people.” Now Investigation of WSJ He suggests that he could start greater than 14 known children, and the sources claim that the actual number will be much higher. The report also describes how Musk keeps these details within the package.

In the middle of all this, based on the report, there may be a longtime Fixer Jared Birchall, which runs the Muska’s family office, but additionally supports the logistics of the developing Muska family, including by developing Hush contracts and serving as a board for moms of some children.

For example, Musk reportedly asked the conservative influence of Ashley St. Clair for signing a restrictive agreement after she gave birth to their son last autumn. Agreement: $ 15 million plus an extra $ 100,000 per 30 days, so long as the kid is 21 in exchange for her silence. She refused; He says that the contract worsens with every treason perceived. (She told the journal that the Muska team sent her only $ 20,000 after they bowed to Musk to comment on his article).

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As for Birchall, which can also be CEO Press-IMPLANTU-IMPLANTU VENTURE NEURALK IA partner In AI Venture XAI in Musk, Muska’s private life management can simply be the third full -time job. According to the journal, in a single two -hour conversation with St. Clair, Birchall told her that the transition “legal path” with musk “always, always leads to a worse result for this woman than otherwise.”

This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com
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Lime scooter and Ebike batteries will be recycled by Redwood Materials

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The joint company Micromobility Lime has reached an agreement on sending batteries utilized in scooters and electronic bikes to Sewoi materials that extract and recycle critical minerals, comparable to lithium, cobalt, nickel and copper.

The agreement announced on Monday makes Redwood Materials the only real battery recycling partner for common scooters and e-bike bikes situated in cities within the United States, Germany and the Netherlands. The contract doesn’t cover every region where lime worksAn inventory covering cities throughout Europe, Asia and Australia.

In Lime up to now he had other recycling partnerships, especially with Sprout through his suppliers. However, for the primary time, the joint company Micromobility had direct relations with battery recycling in North America, which might directly process the fabric for recovery and returns it to the availability chain.

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Redwood Materials, The Carson City, Startup from Nevada founded by the previous CFO Tesla JB Straubel, will get better battery materials when they can’t be used. After recovering and recycling, the materials will be re -introduced within the battery production process. This production system of a closed loop-which can reduce the demand for extraction and refining of minerals-is on the Redwood Materials business center.

The effort can also be consistent with its own goals of limestone sustainable development. Lime is geared toward decarbonization of operations by 2030. The company has made progress in reducing the range 1, 2 and 3 of emissions by 59.5% in five years of basic years 2019. Wapno plans to report the outcomes of carbon dioxide emissions 2024 in May.

“This cooperation means significant progress in the establishment of a more round supply chain, helping our batteries not only to recycled responsibly after reaching the end of their lives, but that their materials are returned to the battery supply chain,” said Andrew Savage, vice chairman for balanced development in Lime.

Lime also has partnerships from Gomi in Great Britain and Voltr in France and other European countries to gather these live battery cells for “Second Life” applications, including, amongst others, in the sphere of consumer electronics, comparable to portable speakers and battery packages.

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Redwood Materials has contracts with other micromobility corporations, including Lyft, RAD Power Bikes and bicycle batteries and scooters specialized in recycling. Redwood, which collected over $ 2 billion in private funds, announced at first of this month, opened the research and development center in San Francisco.

(Tagstranslat) ebikes

This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com
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The Legal Defense Fund withdraws from the META civil law advisory group over Dei Rolback

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Legal Defense Fund,, Meta, dei,


On April 11, the Legal Defense Fund announced that he was leaving the external advisory council for civil rights regarding the fear that the changes in technology company introduced diversity, own capital, inclusion and availability in January.

According to those changes that some perceived as the capitulation of meta against the upcoming Trump administration, contributed to their decision To leave the advisory council of the technology company.

In January, LDF, along with several other organizations of civil rights, which were a part of the board, sent a letter to Marek Zuckerberg, CEO of Meta, outlining their fears As for a way changes would negatively affect users.

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“We are shocked and disappointed that the finish has not consulted with this group or its members, considering these significant changes in its content policy. Non -compliance with even its own advisory group of experts on external civil rights shows a cynical disregard for its diverse users base and undermines the commitment of the meta in the field of freedom of speech with which he claims to” return “.

They closed the letter, hoping that the finish would recommend the ideals of freedom of speech: “If the finish really wants to recommend freedom of speech, he must commit to freedom of speech for all his services. As an advisory group from external civil rights, we offer our advice and knowledge in creating a better path.”

These fears increased only in the next months, culminating in one other list, which from the LDF director, Todd A. Cox, who indicated that the organization withdraws its membership from the META civil law advisory council.

“I am deeply disturbed and disappointed with the announcement of Medical on January 7, 2025, with irresponsible changes in content moderation policies on platforms, which are a serious risk for the health and safety of black communities and risk that they destabilize our republic,” Cox wrote.

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He continued: “For almost a decade, the NACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc. (LDF) has invested a lot of time and resources, working with META as part of the informal committee advising the company in matters of civil rights. However, the finish introduced these changes in the policy of the content modification without consulting this group, and many changes directly with the guidelines from the guidelines from LDF and partners. LD can no longer participate in the scope. ” Advisory Committee for Rights “

In a separate but related LDF list, it clearly resembled a finish about the actual obligations of the Citizens’ Rights Act of 1964 and other provisions regarding discrimination in the workplace, versus the false statements of the Trump administration, that diversity, justice and initiative to incorporate discriminates against white Americans.

“While the finish has modified its policy, its obligations arising from federal regulations regarding civil rights remain unchanged. The title of VII of the Act on civic rights of 1964 and other regulations on civil rights prohibit discrimination in the workplace, including disconnecting treatment, principles in the workplace which have unfair disproportionate effects, and the hostile work environment. Also when it comes to inclusion, and access programs.

In the LDF press release, announcing each letters, Cox He called attention Metal insert into growing violence and division in the country’s social climate.

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“LDF worked hard and in good faith with meta leadership and its consulting group for civil rights to ensure that the company’s workforce reflects the values ​​and racial warehouses of the United States and to increase the security priorities of many different communities that use meta platforms,” ​​said Cox. “Now we cannot support a company in good conscience that consciously takes steps in order to introduce changes in politics that supply further division and violence in the United States. We call the meta to reverse the course with these dangerous changes.”

(Tagstranslate) TODD A. COX (T) Legal Defense Fund (T) META (T) Diversity (T) Equality (T) inclusion

This article was originally published on : www.blackenterprise.com
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