The popular gay, bi, trans, and queer dating app Grindr has announced it will go public via SPAC. Announcing the news, Grindr CEO Jeff Bonforte said, “Grindr is the leading platform focused on the LGBTQ+ community for digital connection and engagement. We have a near ubiquitous global brand in the community we serve, impressive scale, best-in-class user engagement metrics and adjusted EBITDA margin, and we’re still just beginning our monetization and growth journey.”
Here’s what to know about Grindr’s public offering:
- What is Grindr? It’s a popular dating app for the LGBTQ+ community. The company boasts that it’s the “#1 social network for the LGBTQ+ community.”
- How is Grindr going public? Grindr will not debut via an initial public offering, or IPO. Instead, the company will go public through a merger with a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC.
- How is an SPAC different than an IPO? In an IPO, a company will sell its shares directly to the public. In an SPAC, a company merges with a shell company that is already public.
- What company is Grindr merging with? Grindr will merge with the blank check company Tiga Acquisition Corp.
- What market will Grindr trade on? Currently, the Tiga Acquisition Corp trades on the New York Stock Exchange and is likely to remain there after the merger.
- What is Grindr’s stock ticker? Right now it doesn’t have one. But Tiga Acquisition Corp’s stock ticker is TINV. It’s unknown if the stock ticker will change after the merger.
- How much is Grindr valued at? Grindr is valued at around $2.1 billion.
- When will Grindr’s SPAC deal close? No date has been set yet, but Bloomberg reports that the deal will likely close by the end of 2022.
- Anything else to know? The SPAC market has slowed down significantly this year after a number of high-profile deals saw huge losses in 2021. Moreover, the Securities and Exchange Commission recently proposed a plan that would tighten the rules for SPAC companies, in part by requiring additional disclosure.
Grindr says it has 10.8 million monthly active users in 2021. Those users spent an average of 61 minutes on the app per day in December. In 2021, it had revenue of $147 million–an increase of 30% year-over-year.
