Michelle Kennedy (businesswoman)

Michelle Kennedy is a British tech entrepreneur and businesswoman. She is the founder and CEO of Peanut App, an online community for women to connect throughout fertility, pregnancy, motherhood and menopause, launched 2017. She was previously Deputy CEO of Badoo and on the board of Bumble. Michelle is an advocate for building safer social networks and was responsible for Badoo becoming an Internet Watch Foundation member June 2011. 
== Career ==
=== Legal ===
Michelle started her career as a corporate M&A lawyer at Mishcon De Reya. One of her clients was Quotient Bioresearch and in 2010 she joined their team as in-house counsel. 
=== British Ballet Organisation ===
From March 2011 to April 2014 Michelle was a trustee a director of the British Ballet Organisation where she advised on how to think about strategic growth.
=== Badoo and Bumble ===
Later, she was introduced to Andrey Andreev, founder of Badoo. She became Badoo's in-house legal counsel, setting up the legal function before moving to acquire other reporting lines in the business (HR, Finance, Business Intelligence) and later becoming Deputy CEO. During her tenure as Deputy CEO at Badoo, Michelle sat on the board of dating app Bumble.
=== Peanut ===
While working in the dating industry, Michelle gave birth to her first child, Finlay. Her friends who lived nearby weren't at the stage in their lives where they were having children and she started to experience loneliness and isolation. Despite reading books and attending NCT classes, Michelle began to feel like she was losing her identity and wanted to connect with women who understood. She began to look for products that could help her solve this problem but she was unable to find a mobile-first solution to help mothers find friends. 
Michelle launched the Peanut App early 2017 to provide a solution for women looking to find friendship and support at key life stages, including fertility, pregnancy, motherhood and menopause. The app uses algorithms to connect women with shares interests — users can choose from things like “Fitness Fiend,” “Wine Time,” and “Music Is My Medicine.” alongside experiences, whether it’s having a child with special needs or being a single mother.
=== Investments ===
Michelle runs her own fund StartHER where she invests in women and underrepresented founders of all ages, life stages, ethnicities and sexual orientations. Michelle's investments include Linktree, Elvie, Sunroom, Intimately, Lex and more. She is also a scout for the Index Ventures Magnetic Fund II. 
=== Learning Curve ===
Michelle is the host of Vodafone Business podcast "Learning Curve" aimed at aspiring entrepreneurs. In her role as podcast host, Michelle interviews business leaders on the areas that shape business success.
=== Judging Awards ===
In 2018 Michelle judged the WeWork Creator Awards an initiative to support innovating and social-first businesses alongside Ashton Kutcher and Vanessa Kingori. In 2013 Michelle judged the Brilliant Innovators award at Brilliant Minds. She is also judichging the Lovie Awards in 2013 aimed at recognising digital innovations from Europe.
Category:British people
Category:British businesspeople
Category:English people