Crunching the Numbers of 'Shark Tank': A $30M Rejection

Numbers Geek with Steve Ballmer

$30 million. That number will forever be associated with our guest on this week's Numbers Geek podcast, Arum Kang, co-founder and co-CEO of Coffee Meets Bagel. She turned down a $30 million acquisition offer from Mark Cuban for the online dating company that she founded with her two sisters. It was, at the time, the larger offer in the show's history.

So what happened after Shark Tank? On this episode of the Numbers Geek, we get the rest of the story from Arum Kang, a Harvard MBA grad and the co-CEO of Coffee Meets Bagel, the online dating company that she founded with her sisters. In a world of swiping right or left, and judging people by appearances, their approach is to focus on quality rather than quantity of connections. We'll talk about that mission, and we'll look at the underlying data in the United States to understand how trends in the country are making this quest even more challenging and important.

This is the first of two Shark Tank-themed episodes of Numbers Geek. Later this week, we'll feature an interview with Jamie Siminoff, the CEO of smart doorbell maker Ring, who walked away from Shark Tank empty handed but later sold the company to Amazon for a reported $1 billion.

For more Numbers Geek episodes, go to geekwire.com/numbersgeek. See interactive graphics, charts and more at usafacts.org.

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