Tinder’s Sean Rad is stepping down as CEO to become chairman

Tinder CEO Sean Rad is switching jobs again.

Rad, the Tinder co-founder who was pushed out as CEO in early 2015 before returning to the job six months later, is leaving the CEO role once again. Rad will take over as Tinder’s chairman, with current the chairman, Greg Blatt, taking over as Tinder CEO, Rad told Recode Thursday.

Andrew Burton / Getty

(Blatt is also the CEO and chairman of Tinder’s parent company, Match Group, which is owned by Barry Diller’s IAC. He will keep both jobs.)

As part of the switch, Rad will run a new investment vehicle inside the Match Group called Swipe Ventures. The fund’s goal, according to the release, is to “expand Tinder’s footprint through acquisitions, development of new businesses and investments in new and existing businesses, all within the dating and the broader social space.”

So Rad will use Match Group and Tinder cash reserves to invest in or acquire the next big thing under the IAC umbrella. Rad says he’ll be looking at everything from seed-level investments to Series A and B investments and acquisitions.

“If you look at Google, Facebook, Snapchat — all of these companies get to the next wave of growth through acquisition,” Rad said in an interview. “The goal here is to basically just free up some time for me to go do that.”

Rad added that his departure from Tinder’s CEO role is “absolutely different” from when he was pushed out of the role back in March of 2015. He says that the decision to move into this chairman-investor position was “80 percent my idea.”

“It was certainly initiated by me and it took a while to get everyone comfortable with it, but I think I successfully was able to get everybody to realize why this is the best thing for the company in the long run,” Rad said.

When he spoke onstage at Recode’s Code Conference in May, Rad admitted that being fired turned out to be one of the best things that had ever happened to him, providing him with a new perspective.

"When you lose the title you sort of have to ask yourself what's important," Rad said. "What mattered was that I get to wake up every day and work on something that I love."

Rad and Blatt are moving into their new roles immediately. Here’s Rad’s full interview from Code Conference in May.

This article originally appeared on Recode.net.

Will you support Vox’s explanatory journalism?

Most news outlets make their money through advertising or subscriptions. But when it comes to what we’re trying to do at Vox, there are a couple of big issues with relying on ads and subscriptions to keep the lights on:

First, advertising dollars go up and down with the economy. We often only know a few months out what our advertising revenue will be, which makes it hard to plan ahead.

Second, we’re not in the subscriptions business. Vox is here to help everyone understand the complex issues shaping the world — not just the people who can afford to pay for a subscription. We believe that’s an important part of building a more equal society. And we can’t do that if we have a paywall.

So even though advertising is still our biggest source of revenue, we also seek grants and reader support. (And no matter how our work is funded, we have strict guidelines on editorial independence.)

If you also believe that everyone deserves access to trusted high-quality information, will you make a gift to Vox today? Any amount helps.

One-Time Monthly Annual

$5/month

$10/month

$25/month

$50/month

Other

$

Yes, I'll give $5/month

Yes, I'll give $5/month

We accept credit card, Apple Pay, and Google Pay. You can also contribute via