Latest news with #Kianni
Yahoo
03-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Phoebe Gates Reveals How She Beat Tom Brady in Blackjack: ‘Well, I'm Kind of a Loser'
Phoebe Gates shared on the April 30 episode of Alex Cooper's podcast that she once ended up at a blackjack table with the seven-time Super Bowl champion during a celebrity fundraiser, where she beat him Sophia Kianni, her close friend, then referenced a simultaneous embarrassing moment when she tumbled down a spiral staircase at the blackjack event, and was subsequently helped up by Jay-Z 'I'm gushing blood, losing this game. I have no idea how to play,' Kianni said. 'I look over and the whole crowd is around Phoebe. The mastermind beating Tom Brady at blackjack. And everyone's like, 'Who is that girl?' ' Add Phoebe Gates to the short list of people who have defeated NFL legend Tom Brady — although her victory wasn't in a game of football. The 22-year-old daughter of Bill Gates and Melinda French Gates shared on the April 30 episode of Alex Cooper's Call Her Daddy podcast that she once ended up at a blackjack table with the seven-time Super Bowl champion during a celebrity fundraiser, where she beat him. 'Well, I'm kind of a loser. So before the party, I had memorized the stats of how you can win blackjack … the best statistical plays to win because it's a game of luck. Right?' recalled Phoebe, alongside Sophia Kianni, her close friend who was at the event and the co-host of their podcast, The Burnouts. 'And somehow I ended up at a table with Tom Brady and I ended up beating him in blackjack, which Sophia will not stop talking about.' Kianni, 23, chimed in with, 'I talk about it every day,' to which Cooper replied, 'You shouldn't stop talking about that's actually so cool.' Kianni then referenced an embarrassing, blood-inducing moment when she tumbled down a spiral staircase at the blackjack event, and was subsequently helped up by 25-time Grammy winner Jay-Z. Related: Rob McElhenney's Son Saved Signed Tom Brady Trading Card amid L.A. Wildfires Evacuation: 'Of All the Things' (Exclusive) 'I'm gushing blood, losing this game. I have no idea how to play,' Kianni said. 'I look over, and the whole crowd is around Phoebe. The mastermind beating Tom Brady at blackjack. And everyone's like, 'Who is that girl?' ' Phoebe explained, 'I told everyone I was an influencer. I'm like, 'It's called IMG and I model for them. It was tough DNA and IMG, they had a lot of debate over me, but it's you know, it's been a busy career.' Sometime after besting Brady in blackjack, Phoebe, the co-founder of Phia, a sustainable fashion platform that she and Kianni launched in April, recounted seeing the NFL alum out in public. is now available in the Apple App Store! Download it now for the most binge-worthy celeb content, exclusive video clips, astrology updates and more! Related: Kris Jenner Once Told High School Graduates to Keep Their Cars Clean — Here's Why 'I ran into him once recently and he was like, 'Blackjack.' I'm like, 'Yup,' ' she remembered. 'He doesn't know my name. He just knows I was the girl with like the ink written of the different stats on my hand.' Phoebe, who is dating Paul McCartney's grandson Arthur Donald, then admitted she's 'nerdy' when asked if she's 'a Beatles person.' 'Oh man, it's so bad. I'm so bad at music. I mean, my family, like, we're so nerdy, so I knew nothing about music — like I knew about tech stuff growing up, not music stuff,' Phoebe confessed. Read the original article on People
Yahoo
02-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Bill Gates' Daughter Phoebe Says Mom Melinda Gave Tough-Love Advice After Investors Questioned Motherhood Plans: 'Get Up Or Get Out The Game'
Phoebe Gates, co-founder of fashion pricing startup Phia and daughter of Microsoft Corp. co-founder Bill Gates and Melinda French Gates, shared the practical advice her mother gave her after she faced relentless queries from potential investors about future motherhood. What Happened: While raising funds for Phia, Gates and cofounder Sophia Kianni were frequently asked what would happen if they decided to have children. Gates, 22, said on the Call Her Daddy podcast that this line of questioning left her in tears, prompting a call to her mother, who said: "Get up or get out the game, sis." Don't Miss: Maker of the $60,000 foldable home has 3 factory buildings, 600+ houses built, and big plans to solve housing — this is your last chance to become an investor for $0.80 per share. Donald Trump just announced a $500 billion AI infrastructure deal — here's how you can invest in the entertainment market's next big disruptor at $2.25 per share. Why It Matters: Both founders note that such questions often reflect recurring biases they've encountered in the venture capital space. "Always children," Gates said when asked about the most common bias they faced. Kianni recalled flipping the question on a male investor by asking, "What's going to happen to your venture firm when you have kids?" She went on to add: "He's like, 'Why would that affect anything?' And I was like, 'You answered your own question.'' Gates and Kianni's experiences parallel a recent finding from an Oxfam study documenting rising CEO salaries, which showed that out of 45,501 corporations in 168 countries, each with more $10 million in revenue, less than 7% are led by Next: Invest Where It Hurts — And Help Millions Heal: Invest in Cytonics and help disrupt a $390B Big Pharma stronghold. Inspired by Uber and Airbnb – Deloitte's fastest-growing software company is transforming 7 billion smartphones into income-generating assets – with $1,000 you can invest at just $0.30/share! Image Via Shutterstock Send To MSN: Send to MSN Up Next: Transform your trading with Benzinga Edge's one-of-a-kind market trade ideas and tools. Click now to access unique insights that can set you ahead in today's competitive market. Get the latest stock analysis from Benzinga? This article Bill Gates' Daughter Phoebe Says Mom Melinda Gave Tough-Love Advice After Investors Questioned Motherhood Plans: 'Get Up Or Get Out The Game' originally appeared on Sign in to access your portfolio
Time of India
28-04-2025
- Business
- Time of India
Bill Gates daughter Phoebe Gates launches shopping platform that aims to be ‘Google Flights' for fashion
The fashion industry, notorious for being the world's second-largest producer of greenhouse gases and environmental pollutants after oil and gas, generates enough clothing to outfit the next six generations. Amid this backdrop of waste and excess, Stanford graduates Phoebe Gates and Sophia Kianni have launched Phia that aims to tackle this sustainability crisis. Wondering how? The app and desktop tool aggregates secondhand and retail shopping options from across the web, with the aim to make sustainable fashion accessible and affordable. Phia functions as a one-stop shop for fashion. As Kianni told New York Post, the platform is 'Google Flights for fashion.' Phia scours the internet to find the best prices for clothing, enabling users to compare options effortlessly. It aims to address common pain points in secondhand shopping, such as concerns about scams or inflated prices. The app not only prioritizes affordability but also promotes sustainability by encouraging secondhand purchases, reducing the demand for new clothing production, which contributes significantly to the industry's 10% share of global carbon emissions. Phoebe Gates, the youngest daughter of Bill and Melinda Gates, brings a unique perspective to the venture. Beyond her famous lineage, Gates has carved her own path as an advocate and entrepreneur. A Stanford graduate with a degree in human biology, she interned at British Vogue, gaining insight into the fashion world, and has emerged as a prominent voice for reproductive rights. In 2024, she was named Reproductive Freedom for All's Champion of the Year and has spoken at high-profile events like Global Citizen. Her co-founder, Sophia Kianni, is equally accomplished. At 23, Kianni founded Climate Cardinals, the world's largest youth-led climate nonprofit, and serves as the youngest United Nations advisor, bringing her environmental expertise to Phia's mission. Phia's core features include an interface that aggregates listings from platforms like Poshmark, Depop, and major retailers, allowing users to filter by price, size, condition, and sustainability metrics. The platform also provides transparency about an item's environmental impact, such as its carbon footprint or water usage, empowering consumers to make informed choices. For example, buying a secondhand jacket through Phia could save the equivalent of 10 pounds of CO2 emissions compared to purchasing new. The app's algorithm prioritizes listings from verified sellers to ensure authenticity and quality, addressing trust issues prevalent in secondhand markets. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Your Finger Shape Says a Lot About Your Personality, Read Now Tips and Tricks Undo Gates is determined to establish Phia independently of her family's influence. While she acknowledges the privilege her background affords, she and Kianni secured funding without relying on her parents. Their cap table, though private, includes notable investors like Kris Jenner, who revealed her involvement on 'The Burnouts.' 'We want this to be a real company, with a product that stands on its own,' Gates told NY Post.
The Star
28-04-2025
- Business
- The Star
Another Gates gets wired in
NEW YORK: On the top floor of a building near Union Square, there's a small, white-walled office filled with frazzled 20-somethings munching on Cinnamon Crunch and jelly beans. A whiteboard with a countdown calendar is marked off in red. On a shelf nearby, a plaster Roman bust has a pink balloon stuck to his mouth, like a bubble-gum bubble about to pop. Outside the door: a little sign that reads 'Phia', the name of a new e-commerce tool dreamed up by two Stanford grads in their dorm room. A basic startup. Except for one thing: the Gates factor. See, Phia, a web browser/app that went live April 24, aims to be the of fashion, offering an instant price comparison from thousands of e-commerce sites for any item, new or used, that may catch your fancy, is the brainchild of not just any old Stanford undergrads. It is the invention of Phoebe Gates, 22, the youngest child of Bill Gates and his ex-wife, Melinda French Gates, and Phoebe Gates' former roommate Sophia Kianni, 23. It's complicated enough starting a business as a young woman. But starting a tech-adjacent business as a young woman who shares a last name with one of the most famous tech entrepreneurs on the planet – and its 13th-richest person – with all the preconceptions and expectations that implies, is a knotty proposition. 'Growing up, I realised that people are always going to have thoughts about me,' Gates said recently. She was fast-walking across the green market from her office to her apartment. It was Go Day minus 14, and she and Kianni were not sleeping much. 'If the business is successful, people will say, 'It's because of her family',' Gates said. 'And a huge portion of that is true. I never would have been able to go to Stanford, or have such an amazing upbringing, or feel the drive to do something, if it wasn't for my parents. But I also feel a huge amount of internalised pressure.' She knows people will assume her name is how she and Kianni got access to the venture capital firm that is backing them, and met their angel investors and mentors like Kris Jenner, the Kardashian momager; Sara Blakely of Spanx; and Joanne Bradford, the former president of Honey. Why Alex Cooper agreed to sign them to her nascent podcast company to make their own podcast, 'The Burnouts With Phoebe and Sophia', about being 20-something entrepreneurs and BFFs. But this is her answer: 'We're roommates fighting about clothing. We are the girls who are scouring shopping sites for deals. And there are, frankly, thousands of other young women like us.' OK, maybe not exactly like her. But close enough. From Shein to secondhand Chanel Gates, who is named after Phoebe from The Catcher In The Rye , grew up in Seattle, the youngest of three. Her older sister is a paediatric resident, and her brother works for a Congressional committee. During high school, she spent most of her summers in Rwanda. She is extremely competitive, like most of her family, and, like her father, she has attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder. She talks at about 1.5 speed, and her feet have a tendency to jiggle up and down when she sits. She was raised, like her brother and sister, to be engaged with philanthropy rather than with Microsoft (her father retired from the company when she was six to focus on the Gates Foundation) and to do her own thing. Unlike the rest of her family, she is an extrovert. She is the child 'the most different than I am', Bill Gates said, 'because she's so good with people. When we would go on family vacations, we would find some part of the beach to just be off on our own, and Phoebe would go down the beach and meet people and bring them back to introduce them to us.' She is also the one who loves fashion. She lives in a loftlike two-bedroom apartment with two ragdoll cats, an open-plan living-dining-kitchen area, 20-foot ceilings and a walk-in closet organised according to colour. 'I used to dress so badly,' Phoebe Gates said. She was wearing vintage Chanel ankle boots, a Reformation dress, a Nili Lotan blazer from Poshmark (she is a fan of blazers) and some Tiffany jewellery she bought on the RealReal. When she got to college, she said, 'I used to dress in, like, Forever 21 and Shein. Sophia saw me and was like, 'Oh girl, no'.' Gradually, as she started dressing nicer, she discovered things secondhand. 'Like, I found a pair of Prada pants for US$200 (RM874) on the RealReal, and I would wear them every single day,' she said. Now she buys most of her clothes via resale, and her brother asks her advice on his outfits. Every Sunday, she creates her looks for the week and hangs them on a clothing rail so she does not have to think about them in the morning. She loves pink. Her bedroom at home is pale pink. Over her bureau is a painting of a pink cassette tape that she bought in a market for about US$20 (RM87). Her boyfriend hates it, she said. She has been dating Arthur Donald, Paul McCartney's grandson, for almost two years. They met when she and Kianni did a collaboration with Stella McCartney, his aunt. He lives in California and tries to come to New York for weekends. When he visits, she said, he takes the painting off the wall. They are looking for something to replace it. She is very online: She has almost 500,000 Instagram followers, to whom she posts photos of her activism and black-tie awards nights with Donald, like the Albie Awards of the Clooney Foundation for Justice, and about 242,000 TikTok followers. One of her most popular TikToks involved a bubble tea showdown with her father. They have an ongoing argument about texting. He likes email; she does not. (Now he texts her when he has sent her an email.) They share, however, an appetite for what he calls 'risk.' Rewriting the Stanford narrative The idea for Phia, a portmanteau of Phoebe and Sophia, started with Gates (who once thought she might go into women's health, the focus of her philanthropy) and Kianni (who wanted to be an environmental lawyer) trying to come up with a pitch to get into an entrepreneurship class. First, they thought of a Bluetooth-smart tampon that would know what was going on with your hormones, iron level and so on. They considered making 'the Gen Z version of LinkedIn'. Then, they thought about what so many women who started their own fashion labels had thought about: their own experience. Gates remembered seeing an Area dress she had bought for US$500 (RM2,187) reselling for US$150 (RM656) on the RealReal and feeling, she said, 'so foolish'. Kianni, who is Iranian American, grew up in Washington, D.C. and started a climate change organisation, Climate Cardinals, when she was in high school (it translates climate resources into 100 languages); she was already a dedicated resale shopper. They thought there had to be others like them – you know, Gates said, 'smart girls, age 25 to 30, who want to shop like a genius and get the best price in one click.' They were so excited about the idea that they wanted to drop out and get started right away, but their mothers stepped in. 'They both were like, 'Yeah, it's not happening',' Gates said. Still, she graduated in three years instead of four so they could move to New York, 'where fashion is,' and get going. When she told her father that she and Kianni wanted to get into the e-commerce space, his reaction, he said, was 'Wow, a lot of people have tried, and there's some big guys in there.' He was worried she might ask for money. 'I thought, 'Oh boy, she's going to come and ask,' Bill Gates said. (Last month, he told Raj Shamani on a podcast that he gave his children 'less than 1%' of his total wealth because he wanted them to make their own way, though that is still multimillions each.) He probably would have helped fund Phia, he said. 'And then I would have kept her on a short leash and be doing business reviews, which I would have found tricky, and I probably would have been overly nice but wondered if it was the right thing to do? Luckily, it never happened.' Instead Phoebe Gates used him for advice, mostly on personnel issues. 'When it comes to shopping, I'm not exactly the target audience,' Bill Gates said. Her mother, who she calls her 'rock', told her she had to raise the capital on her own. 'She saw it as a real opportunity for me to, like, learn and fail,' Phoebe Gates said. She and Kianni started with US$100,000 (RM437,400) from Soma Capital and a Stanford grant of US$250,000 (RM1.09mil) from a social entrepreneurship programme. After a lot of rejections, they finally secured venture backing, including another US$500,000 (RM2.18mil) from angel investors. And they have their network of power female mentors. Now Phia employs four full-time engineers, as well as an operations manager and a designer who is in her last year at Rutgers University. All the employees have equity. Revenue will come from affiliate links. (There are 40,000 sites, new and resale, linked to the Phia platform, which shows not just matches but also items that are similar – in an earlier season's colour palette, for example, or a different size.) Gates and Kianni are particularly proud of their price graph: a straightforward gauge that pops up when you are looking at a skirt, say, or a bag or even a pair of earrings to tell you instantly if the cost is fair, high or low, and whether the piece will retain its value on the secondary market. Even someone like Gates could not have anticipated just how good that information, coming amid worldwide tariff-pricing confusion, might look. – ©2025 The New York Times Company This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
New York Post
25-04-2025
- Business
- New York Post
Phia's Phoebe Gates and Sophia Kianni are creating a new kind of founder
The fashion industry is the world's second largest producer of greenhouse gases and environmental pollutants, behind only the oil and gas industry. It's also rife with waste and excess, having already produced enough apparel to clothe the next six generations. Now, two recent Stanford graduates are trying to make fashion more sustainable by improving the secondhand shopping experience. On Thursday, Phoebe Gates, 22, and Sophia Kianni, 23, launched Phia, an app and desktop tool that aggregates secondhand and retail shopping options from across the internet. 'It's like 'Google Flights' for fashion,' Kianni told me. 'Phia finds you the best price in one click … and allows you to really easily price compare.' 4 Phoebe Gates (left), 22, and Sophia Kianni, 23, are trying to make fashion more sustainable by improving the secondhand shopping experience. Brian Zak/NY Post She added, 'How do you know that you're not getting scammed? How do you know it's actually the best price possible? We built the tool that we wish had existed back when we were in college,' While the pair only recently graduated from Stanford, they already have more accolades than many people twice their age. Kianni is founder of the world's largest youth-led climate nonprofit, Climate Cardinals, and is the youngest United Nations advisor. Gates interned at British Vogue and has become a notable voice in reproductive rights — speaking at events such as Global Citizen and being named the Reproductive Freedom for All's Champion of the Year last year. She is also the daughter of Bill and Melinda Gates. While Phia is their first priority — they were up with their team until 3 a.m. working out bugs the night before our interview — they're not just trying to change the way people shop, they're also trying to be more transparent about the founder experience. In early April, they launched 'The Burnouts,' a podcast on 'Call Her Daddy' founder Alex Cooper's Unwell Network that chronicles their entrepreneurial experiences. 4 In early April, they launched 'The Burnouts,' a podcast on 'Call Her Daddy' founder Alex Cooper's Unwell Network that chronicles their entrepreneurial experiences. Getty Images for Roc Nation 'We really felt that there was a huge white space in the market … When you look at Founder Podcasts, it's always experts who've sold their companies, who've achieved all this,' Gates told me. 'But I wanted someone who was just starting out, who was a noob, asking all the questions that everyone else felt were too dumb to ask.' She added, 'One thing for us that's been really important is shedding some light on what the founder experience is actually like.' Listening to episodes of 'The Burnouts' (a title many of us can relate to) is less 'How I Built This' and more how in the world do I build this?! In the first episode, Gates and Kianni tell guest Kris Jenner about some of their failed business ideas, including a bluetooth tampon, and some of their hacks, such as creating a fake assistant to give them more credibility. 4 In the first episode, Gates and Kianni tell guest Kris Jenner about some of their failed business ideas, including a bluetooth tampon, and some of their hacks, such as creating a fake assistant to give them more credibility. Bre Johnson/ While the podcast reveals the challenges and realities of starting something new, it's also been launched on a platform with over 34 million listeners — many of whom are young women in Phia's target demographic. Talking about themselves is good promotion for the fashion app. 'A really critical piece of marketing is this founder-led growth and pulling back the curtain on what it's like to be a founder and to learn,' Gates said. Understanding what they're best suited for, has been key. 'We had all these ideas in these different industries that are fascinating, but it really was this question of are we the right people to build this thing? I remember one thing we discussed was electric cruise ships for shipping … But are we the right people to build that?,' Gates said. 4 Phoebe Gates said her father, Bill Gates, has advised her but she hasn't looked to him for Phia funding. AFP via Getty Images She added, 'This entire industry of fashion tech is fascinating to me. Women are spending a huge amount of money on shopping, and the fact we're not delivering a personalized experience to them that's good for their wallets and the world is crazy to me.' While Gates has nothing but appreciation for her family, she is focused on making her own name in the tech world — and far more eager to talk about her own work than her family's. This story is part of NYNext, an indispensable insider insight into the innovations, moonshots and political chess moves that matter most to NYC's power players (and those who aspire to be). When raising funding for Phia, she didn't look to her parents. (The cap table is private, but Kris Jenner revealed she is on it). 'We don't want this to be something that's funded by my family — we want this to be a real company,' Gates told me. 'That's really important for us … while I have a ton of privilege coming from my family, it's about having a product that stands on its own.' Growing up, it was always clear that she would make her own way. 'Seeing the example that my parents led with the foundation and their own work has been an incredible example to me,' she said. 'There was never an expectation that we were gonna not work the rest of our lives.' Earlier this month, her father very pointedly said that he isn't trying to turn his family into a dynasty. Perhaps that is why Gates and Kianni are seeking to build theirs. Send NYNext a tip: nynextlydia@
