Archives December 2010

Seek takes JobsDB and increases its Asian/Chinese reach

INTERNET job hunting giant Seek has expanded further into southeast Asia, taking a $206 million stake in a Hong Kong-based online recruitment website.

Seek yesterday announced it had purchased the majority holding in employment website Jobs DB Inc, giving it a 60 per cent slice of the Chinese company through the creation of a new company, Seek Asia.

Seek Asia is a partnership between Seek, James Packer’s Consolidated Media Holdings, Macquarie Capital and Tiger Global.

Seek’s co-chief executive Andrew Bassat said the move into Asia “built upon the company’s existing international footprint” and exposed the company to “attractive regions”.

“We believe this transaction represents a compelling opportunity for Seek to play an increasingly meaningful role and to expand its exposure in the region.”

Seek’s latest acquisition adds to several other major international investments including Chinese online jobs board Zhaopin; Southeast Asian recruitment website JobStreet and employment sites in Brazil and Mexico.

Evans and Partners analyst Paul Ryan said the Jobs DB acquisition would be part of Seek’s long term strategy to become a leader in the Pan-Asian online employment market.

“When you add Jobs DB in, the combined businesses have a larger, more diversified and better presence in southern China,” Mr Ryan said. “It’s a bigger, more diversified and more profitable business.”

Mr Ryan said he expected Macquarie and Tiger Global to exit Seek Asia through an IPO at a later date.

However, another analyst said Seek may have been spreading itself too thin with its latest Asian investment following co-founder and chief executive Paul Bassat’s plans to leave the company in mid-2011.

“This is another company that they have to integrate and manage and try to grow,” said the analyst, who declined to be named.

Seek Australia has a 69 per cent holding in Seek Asia and the other 31 per cent, $64 million, will be divided between the three other co-investors.

Mr Packer’s $25 million Seek Asia investment was his first since selling out of Seek Australia last year for $440 million.

The media and casino mogul has also invested in Seek’s Brazilian acquisition, Brasil Online Holding, and made an unsuccessful attempt to get Paul Bassat on the Ten Network board.

Seek shares rose 1c to $6.57.

China, India lead list of best countries for new jobs

On CBS’ 60 Minutes last Sunday, the Brazilian billionaire Eike Batista told correspondent Steve Kroft that he’s hiring Americans to weld his oil platforms.

“To weld the platforms?” Kroft responded incredulously. “Yes,” replied Batista, explaining that his country’s booming economy is at almost full employment, and Brazil needs to import workers. “Already we have created this year 1.5 million jobs,” continued the world’s eighth richest man according to Forbes’ most recent tally. “It’s unbelievable.”

That unbelievable job growth is reflected in the latest global employment outlook survey by the staffing firm Manpower. Brazil rates fourth on the tally of the nations with the greatest optimism about hiring in the first quarter of next year. Brazil’s net hiring outlook–the number of employers surveyed who expect to increase their employment rolls minus the percentage who expect to decrease them–is 36%. That’s driven by a 7% gross domestic product growth rate, three times higher than in the U.S.

Manpower surveyed 64,000 human resource directors and senior hiring managers from public and private concerns worldwide to come up with its list. It asked each of them about their expectations for hiring in the first quarter of 2011. Almost half, 47% of them, came from 10 countries in the Americas, 24% from eight countries in Asia and the Pacific, and 29% from Europe, the Middle East and Africa. “This is very much a macro-economic look at new job creation,” says the staffing firm’s chairman and chief executive, Jeffrey Joerres.

The results are striking, if not surprising. India has pulled ahead of China since last quarter to take first place, with a whopping 42% net hiring outlook for the first quarter of 2011. China follows close behind at 40%, a 2% decrease from last quarter. Taiwan comes in third, with a net employment outlook of 37%.

Next in line, after Brazil: Turkey, at 27%.”There are 75 million people in Turkey,” Joerres notes, “more than people realize.” And so, despite a lingering debt overhang, there are plenty of consumers buying stuff and driving growth and hiring. Next up after Turkey: Singapore, with a net hiring outlook of 26% for the first quarter.

Are these new jobs ones that should prompt Americans to consider moving? Possibly, says Joerres, though much of the demand gets filled by people from neighboring countries. Outfits like Manpower, which has offices in 82 countries, and the plethora of online job listings make the international job market ever more transparent.

While many of the openings are for low-paying jobs, there are also plenty of opportunities for highly qualified professionals, especially in fields like geoengineering and information systems, Joerres says. Oil and gas engineers are in high demand, for instance. That’s a minority of the workers who relocate internationally for jobs, he adds, but it’s a minority that’s growing: “It’s still on the margin, but the margin has gotten bigger.”

The countries rounding out the list include Peru, Costa Rica and Argentina as well as Australia and Hong Kong.

How does the U.S. rate? Better than you might expect. It has a 9% net hiring outlook.

China to Revise Job Categories List

China will revise its list of 1,838 different kinds of job categories, which was made by the Ministry of Labor and Social Security, Quality and Technical Supervision Bureau and National Statistics Bureau in 1999.

The revision would reflect China’s social structure better and help future workforce analysis and human resources development, said Yin Weimin, the Minister of Human Resources and Social Security and head of the revision committee, said at a ceremony held here Thursday.

As the country developed over the past decade, many occupations faded out while new ones appeared and thus the job list needed to be adjusted accordingly, Yin said.

The revision is expected to be finished in the first half of 2012.