Singapore – As part of its vision to be one of the leading digital career platforms in the Asia-Pacific, tech company SEEK that owns recruitment marketplace platforms JobStreet and JobsDB, has announced investment amounting to US$48m to JobKorea, a South Korea-based online recruitment platform.
The investment entails SEEK having a 10% stake of JobKorea, as well as having Peter Bithos, CEO of SEEK, to join JobKorea’s board.
For Bithos, said investment partnership is a big win not only for SEEK and JobKorea, but more importantly for all jobseekers and employers in Asia, adding that with JobKorea, they 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. 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,” he said.
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.
Meanwhile 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.
“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,” said Yoon Byung-joon, CEO at JobKorea.
At present, 90% of JobKorea is owned by Affinity Equity Partners (AEP), a global private equity player and the largest in Korea. AEP acquired 100% of JobKorea back in May 2021.
SEEK in Asia has also seen some corporate moves as well recently, with the appointment of former HOOQ marketing head Jane Cruz-Walker as its chief marketing officer.
