Bumble founder Whitney Wolfe Herd, 34, quits as CEO of female-friendly dating app after its share price fell 80% in two years (and now she’s enjoying private jet trips with Harry and Meghan)

Bumble founder Whitney Wolfe Herd has stepped down as CEO of the female-friendly dating app after its share price fell 80 percent in two years.

Wolfe Herd, 34, founded Bumble almost a decade ago at the age of 24 and turned it into a multi-billion dollar business – and she will now remain with the company as executive chairman.

The mother of two handed the role to veteran tech and business executive Lidiane Jones, sending shares down more than 8 percent in early trading on Monday.

Jones is the CEO of Slack, owned by Salesforce, and has held senior business roles at Microsoft, where she worked for more than a dozen years. She will take over on January 2.

Over the years, Wolfe Herd has been surrounded by powerful women in her orbit, including Meghan Markle, with whom she was spotted at a Katy Perry concert last weekend, business mogul Kris Jenner, and Lauren Sanchez.

“Lidiane’s expertise and track record in products and technology is exceptional,” said Wolfe Herd as the company looks to incorporate artificial intelligence into its products.

Wolfe Herd, 34, launched the company in 2014 after an acrimonious departure from Match Group’s rival app Tinder, which she co-founded.

Bumble’s eponymous app stood out in the industry because it allowed women to make the first move.

In recent years, Bumble, which counts Friends, Badoo, Fruitz (for Gen Z) and Official in its portfolio of dating services, has faced pressure to grow due to turmoil in some markets such as Eastern Europe and competition from the bigger rival Match.

Bumble raised more than $2 billion in its initial public offering in February 2021, building on momentum for internet-based dating services amid pandemic-induced movement restrictions.

At the time she rang the Nasdaq bell, Bumble was at the top of its $13 billion valuation.

However, share values ​​have fallen by a quarter since then as tailwinds diminished.

Shares traded above $70 per share on opening day and have since fallen to below $14.

This is the second major executive departure from Bumble this year, following the departure of president Tariq Shaukat, who stepped down after three years in the role.

“We are incrementally negative on the news pending further details…we view Whitney’s departure as a headwind to the business over the medium term and negative to overall company morale,” Evercore analysts said in a note.

Bumble will report third-quarter results on Tuesday.

News of her departure came just days after she took private jet trips with Harry and Meghan to watch Katy Perry’s residency performance in Las Vegas.

Whitney Wolfe Herd and her husband Michael Herd joined the Sussexes, as did Cameron Diaz and her rocker husband Benji Madden, Zoe Saldana and Marco Perego, David Katzenberg and Stellina Bickers.

They all took the same private jet from Santa Barbara to Las Vegas on Saturday.

Whitney is married to Michael Herd, an oil and gas heir from Texas. They met on a ski trip in Aspen and share two children together.

In 2020, he put his family’s three-home complex in Austin, Texas, on the market for $28.5 million.

Wolfe Herd has received award after award for her work in technology and dating apps. In 2014, she was named one of the Top 30 Women Under 30 in Technology by Business Insider.

And in 2016, she was named one of Elle’s Women in Tech, before receiving recognition as a Forbes 30 under 30 in 2017 and 2018.

In 2021, Wolfe Herd became the world’s youngest self-made female billionaire after taking Bumble public.

Forbes estimated her net worth at around $1.5 billion.