Spark Networks recently acquired Zoosk, making it the #3 global Internet dating company by revenue.  Spark Networks includes Jdate, Elite Singles, Silver Singles, Attractive World.  Spark is an acquirer of choice in the dating industry.  Jeronimo is your host. He joined the dating industry in 2015.

Mark's team has worked with 110 dating companies and service providers since 2005. He runs the dating business agency/consultancy Courtland Brooks, along with OPW.news, and IDEA.gp. Mark is your co-host. Mark joined the dating industry in 1998.  

Muru founded Matrimony in 2000. For the last 18 years he's pioneered matchmaking and online matrimony in India and now employees over 4000 people with 140 locations. Muru joined the dating industry in 2000. 

Geoff Cook heads The Meet Group which is a public company (NASDAQ) and comprises the industry leading brands Meetme, Lovoo, Tagged, Skout and Growlr.  One-to-many video is a key feature of The Meet Group dating apps.  Geoff joined the dating industry in 2005.  

Charly started Lumen in 2018, working with Badoo/Magic Labs founder Andrey Andreev.  Prior to that she ran the The Dating Awards and worked with eHarmony, M14, Gaydar, TimeOut and The Guardian.  Charly joined the dating industry in 2013.

Carsten leads Insparx group of International dating services which includes Be2 and cdate in 37 countries with a team of 160. Prior to working with Insparx he set up operations at FriendScout24. Carsten became dedicated to the dating industry in 2002.

David took a different approach to dating by starting The Inner Circle, which focuses on real world gatherings, and is exclusive and selective. David started Sullivans List in 2010 which is a list of amazing events.  He entered the dating game in 2012 when he was inspired to start The Inner Circle. 

Tobias cofounded Lovoo and quickly grew it to one of the top European dating apps. The Meet Group acquired Lovoo in 2017 and it transitioned to offering video in 2018. Lovoo is one of the first dating apps to accept Bitcoin. Tobias joined the dating industry when he started Lovoo in 2012. 

Arnaud brings a fresh perspective to the dating industry.  He's spent the last 10 years at SAP, and the last 4 years as COO of SAP France. 

Didier was one of the early entrants in the mobile dating app race with Happn, and quickly grew it to a leadership position. Happn is the first and the leading 'real time encounter app.'  Didier also founded video discovery site DailyMotion before turning his attention to people discovery with Happn in 2013. 

Eric is taking over the helm at Spark Networks.  He spent 5 years with McKinsey consulting on growth strategy and M&A, and 5 years as CEO of Criteo, building it to $2.3B revenues.  Eric is new to the dating industry, and will introduce himself to us at IDEA SUMMIT. 

Jens ran a European social network and then created Jaumo which is a social dating app network with 40M+ members. Jaumo is in 90 countries and is in 59 languages. Jens started Jaumo in 2011.

Luciana heads marketing for all Spark dating properties.  She's new to the dating industry as of Jan 2019, and brings a wealth of marketing experience from online money transfer, furniture ecommerce and a leading online platform for executive recruitment.

From Morgan Stanley Billion dollar trading to dating.  Shahzad moved from algorithmic money manager to Muslim-focused love matchmaking.  Muzmatch is backed by Y Combinator and a raft of smart investors, has 1.5m members, 35k success stories, and is a growing 20 person team. Shahzad shifted into the dating industry in 2014.

Ross started White Label Dating and built it to be the leading turnkey SaaS for online dating. Venntro Media's White Label Dating product now powers thousands of dating sites around the world and sites on the platform have generated over $390m revenues to date. Ross joined the dating industry in 2003.

Miles is responsible for over 450M users, 7 brands, 4 platforms. Manager of 6 Heads of Departments (Product, Design, Billing, BI, Community Operations, Strategy) and conductor of 350+ Developers. Magic Labs announced a fund of $100m+ for visionary dating apps.  Miles is a Cambridge University Law Grad who fell in love with the dating industry in 2012.

Singles need help, and many are now willing to pay for timely and considered guidance and relationship nudges.  Relationship AI is being built to help the dating industry solve the continuity problem.  Karinna joined the dating (advice) industry in 1997 and is a wealth of end-user experience.

Zackary is a former US Marine, successful serial entrepreneur and expert in streaming and mobile app technologies. Following his last successful exit, he founded Say Allo in 2015, a relationship discovery app that uses a continuous learning algorithm, video and a compatibility index co-developed by the inventor of Cognitive Behavior Therapy.

Gitte is a lawyer and celebrates her first year at Spark in December.  She heads Spark's people, office, legal and compliance functions.  Gitte brings the legal perspective.

Mamba is the top Russian dating platform.  Wamba is their International offering.  Yaroslav manages 200 people across 5 offices in 4 countries.  Yaroslav has a technical programming background.  He joined the dating industry in 2007 when he joined Mamba.

Violet started Lunch Actually with her husband Jamie Lee in 2004.  Violet is a llawyer turned banker turned matchmaker.  Lunch Actually bring people together in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Hong Kong and Indonesia for lunch dates.

Marcos created the first online dating company in Brazil in 1997, sold the company in 1999 and then bought it back in 2009.  Namoro serves a number of niches and is particularly strong in the Christian and senior singles segments.    

City Swoon straddles the online and offline world and is a fascinating dating company out of Australia.  Singles go on events at multiple bars, and meet up with their matches for a pseudo speed-dating experience.  This is all facilitated by the app.  Brett joined the dating industry in 2009.

Ben is IDEA Alumni.  We'll try and get one former senior member of the dating industry to bring their perspective at each event.  Ben spent 5 years in the dating industry from 2012, when he co-founded Lovoo, thru 2017 when it was sold to The Meet Group for $70m. Ben is starting a Dresden based startup incubator. 

Parship Group includes Parship, Elite Partner and eHarmony.  Dominik has been investment director at Nucom since 2016, and on the board of Parship since 2017.  He brings the investor perspective.