DHI, UpWork, LinkedIn all up: news of the job board and recruitment marketing industry

As always, it’s been an eventful several weeks in our industry, with StackOverflow shutting down their job board, some rebranding, Upwork making bankd, and lots of funding activity. Throw in some interesting Q4 financials and a few acquisitions, and you have good times for all! Let’s dig into it:

• HelloWork sees 39% growth: HelloWork group reported 71 million euros in orders in 2021, an increase of 20 million euros compared to 2021 (+ 39% growth). The Diplomeo,  Jobijoba and Seekube companies, which  have joined the group over the past 3 years, have seen their business grow by +32 % a year on average. Acquisitions of Diplomeo and Jobijoba expanded the services and know-how of HelloWork in initial training and in datascience. The company’s long-standing activities (Regionsjob, MaFormation, BDM) have also continued to grow, with an increase of 40% in 2021. Congrats!
• New job board targets whistleblowers: Lioness brings a brand new offering: publisher of whistleblower accounts on one hand, career matchmaker on the other. The Lioness job board was created with whistleblowers in mind, “to bring together good people with good employers,” the website reads. For inclusion on the Lioness job board, an employer must first be nominated by its employees, then meet certain other criteria through vetting by Lioness. Very interesting.
• Recruiter.com claims $8.8M in Q4 revenue: Recruiter.com Group Inc said it expects to report about $8.8 million in revenue for its fiscal fourth quarter of 2021.  The company said its 4Q revenue figure, which is preliminary and unaudited, marks organic sequential growth of 40% and a 166% year-over-year increase. Annual revenue is expected to come in at $22.6 million.  Up up up.
• Feats raises cash:  Project-based hiring platform Feats has raised €2 million ($2.3 million U.S.) which it will use to increase headcount and expand to new markets across Europe and beyond. Feats describes itself as the first professional network based on verified roles in projects rather than employment history. The Copenhagen-based company says it has over 4,500 projects, representing an estimated 2,700 person-years of work by technical, creative, and business professionals. Interesting model.
• LinkedIn revenue up 37%: Microsoft Corp. reported revenue at LinkedIn rose 37% year over year to $3.53 billion in the company’s fiscal second quarter ended Dec. 31, an increase of 36% as measured in constant currency. Microsoft noted that LinkedIn’s growth was driven by advertising demand in its marketing solution business, which increased 43% year over year, and by an improving job market in its talent solutions business. The company has also filed a federal lawsuit against a Singapore-based company Mantheos Ptd. Ltd and its founders for the “unauthorized scraping of millions of LinkedIn member profiles.” Finally, LinkedIn  is pulling the plug on LinkedIn Lite, the lightweight Android application it debuted in 2017 to help connect professionals in low-connectivity and low-bandwidth markets such as India. They’re keeping busy!
• DHI revenue up 25% YOY: DHI Group, which runs Dice and ClearanceJobs, had total revenue of $33.7 million, up 10% sequentially and 25% year over year. Total bookings were $36.2 million, up 35% year over year. “Based on our continued strong bookings growth, we expect first quarter total revenue to be in the range of $32.0 million to $33.0 million, representing growth of between 20% and 23% year over year,” commented Kevin Bostick, CFO of DHI Group, Inc. Well, that’s a change!
• iHire launches HR services:  iHire has added Human Resources Services & Consulting to its employer solutions portfolio.  The company now delivers fully customized, people-centric HR services designed to help businesses attract and onboard talent, motivate and retain employees, simplify compliance, and streamline processes. Services include candidate screening, background investigations, reference checks, and offer letter writing, job description development, compensation strategy guidance, performance management and approvals, employment handbook and policy development, employee training, employee and corporate communications, termination services, and more. Interesting.
• UpWork Q4 revenue up: UpWork posted a 29% year-over-year increase in total revenue in Q4, taking the total figure to $137 million. Marketplace revenue accounted for $125 million of the total, also up by 29% over the timeframe. Gross Services Volume (GSV) rose by 41% year-over-year to $3.5 billion, while revenue climbed 35% year-over-year to stand at $503 million for the full-year 2021. Impressive.
• Nowsta lands funding: Nowsta has raised $41 million in Series B funding in a round led by GreatPoint Ventures that brings the company’s total funding raised to date to $59 million. Nowsta’s web and mobile app rolls workforce management tools, like automated scheduling, time-tracking, payroll and communication, into an all-in-one resource that includes an on-demand labor marketplace that connects employers with a skilled pool of workers sourced by trusted third-party staffing providers.  The company’s technology manages over 300,000 workers each month across 600 employers, including sports stadiums, hotels, food services vendors and warehouses. Also impressive.
• Handshake raises even more money: Student-focused recruitment site Handshake is on a tear, closing a third major funding round in 16 months and claiming a valuation of $3.5 billion, more than double what it had last year.  The latest round of $200 million was led by Coatue Management and Valiant Peregrine Fund. The start-up that competes with established sites such as CollegeRecruiter and AfterCollege, as well as newer entrants such as RippleMatch, has built an enormous traffic advantage over those rivals by taking over college career centers. The company’s headcount has doubled over the past year to 500, according to the announcement. Intriguing.
• Otta does a Series A: London-based Otta has a platform for matching jobs at tech companies with candidates by aggregating a lot of information about the company (founder bios, employee reviews, salaries, industry) with the roles offered. Think a sort of “CrunchBase for Jobs”. The company has raised $20M from Tiger Global. Since launching in January 2020 Otta says it has gone from 1,000 applications sent per month to more than 5,000 every day. Congrats!
• InfoEdge profits are up: Info Edge India Ltd., the parent company of Naukri.com and 99Acres, registered 64.5% year-over-year growth in profit for the October-December quarter in 2021. Total profit stood at $48.2 million, with the company reporting $29.0 million as exceptional gains from “startup investments.” Recruitment solutions — particularly Naukri.com — remain Info Edge’s primary revenue drivers, generating $39.8 million U.S. in Q3, FY21-22. Info Edge has over 4,500 employees working out of 66 offices in 45 cities across India and the Middle East. Wow.
• Byteboard lands seed funding: Byteboard landed a $5 million seed round led by Cowboy Ventures along with a diverse set of angel investors, with half being women and more than a third Black. “Byteboard is a software-based solution that’s actually helping companies replace their pre-on-site technical interviews with a project-based interview that helps them hire faster through a much more positive, streamlined, practical interview process,” said co-founder Sargun Kaur. The company has designed an interview that the hiring manager gives to candidates to do on their own time in the environment where they are most comfortable working. Very interesting!

Wow. And you would not believe the stuff I had to leave out because of space! Well, it’s a very interesting time to be in our industry, with lots of opportunities. I will keep covering them for you. Until next time…

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