SEEK Limited (SEEK), the Australian listed tech company which owns two leading online employment marketplaces JobStreet and JobsDB in Southeast Asia, today announced a USD48M investment in JobKorea, Korea’s largest online employment platform. SEEK will own a 10% stake, and Peter Bithos, CEO of SEEK Asia, will join JobKorea’s Board.
Commenting on the investment, Peter said: “This partnership is a big win not only for SEEK and JobKorea, but more importantly for all jobseekers and employers in Asia. With JobKorea, the leading job marketplace in Korea, we can now touch the lives of an additional 25 million jobseekers and 5 million employers in one of the largest economies in the world.”
“Through this investment, we look forward to helping JobKorea with our market-leading insights into big data, how to leverage AI, and our commercial and technical experience building the leading jobs and career marketplaces across APAC,” he added. “We also look forward to learning from JobKorea as it continues to build on its leadership in one of Asia’s most dynamic, sophisticated markets.”
This investment will provide an opportunity for SEEK to add value to JobKorea’s market leading position, while SEEK focuses on its operations, fast-tracking its ongoing transformation and growth of its existing Asia businesses. SEEK’s digital teams continue to make major inroads in building products and solutions driven by AI and market data, which combined with SEEK’s deep local insights and resources in each location, differentiate it from other international players.
For JobKorea, this partnership will provide an opportunity to leverage SEEK’s experienced management team and their significant expertise in operating global online employment and human capital management platforms.
Yoon Byung-joon, CEO of JobKorea, said “We are delighted to have a partnership with SEEK, a company with a wealth of experience in the global online employment market. We believe that this relationship will be an opportunity for JobKorea to make a quantum leap to the next level. With competition becoming ever fiercer to hire talented people such as good managers, developers or tech specialists, JobKorea will move toward a global HR platform that connects the Korean employment marketplace internationally.”
The remaining 90% of JobKorea is owned by Affinity Equity Partners (AEP), a leading global private equity player and the largest in Korea. AEP acquired 100% of JobKorea in May 2021.
About SEEK
SEEK is a diverse group of companies, comprised of a strong portfolio of online employment, educational, commercial and volunteer businesses. SEEK has a global presence (including Australia, New Zealand, China, Hong Kong, South-East Asia, Brazil and Mexico), with exposure to over 2.9 billion people and approximately 27 per cent of global GDP. SEEK makes a positive contribution to people’s lives on a global scale. SEEK is listed on the Australian Securities Exchange, where it is a top 100 company and has been listed in the Top 20 Most Innovative Companies by Forbes.
SEEK operates leading online employment marketplaces across Asia through JobStreet (https://www.jobstreet.com.sg/) and JobsDB (https://sg.jobsdb.com/), with presence in Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, Shenzhen, Singapore, Thailand, and the Philippines. The business has a strong brand and a significant presence in the South East Asia region, attracting 400 million visits a year. https://www.seek.com.au/about/
About JobKorea
JobKorea, established in 1996, is the largest online employment marketplace platform operator in Korea. The Company operates two online employment marketplaces, JobKorea (full-time) and Albamon (part-time), where employers place their job postings and candidates search through the platforms to find suitable positions. JobKorea is the only employment marketplace platform in Korea that services both full time and part time markets.
As the #1 player, JobKorea has 25 million jobseekers and 5 million employers with 11 million unique visitors and 110 million job postings in as of yearend 2020. https://www.jobkorea.co.kr/
