HRnetGroup
Two Worlds
HRnetGroup is a executive search organisation founded in 1992 operating in 13 cities: The company was listed in SGX on Jun-2017.
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Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Jakarta
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Seoul, Tokyo, Taipei
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Beijing, Guangzhou, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Suzhou
Services provided includes:
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Professional & flexible staff placement
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Contract negotiation
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Onboarding & Off-boarding
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Payroll processing & benefits management
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Training & development
The company has 200 consultants under 7 brands - HRnetOne, PeopleSearch, PeopleFirst, SearchAsia, RecruitLegal, HRnetRimbun, REForce.
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Business are categorised into:
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Professional recruitment
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Flexible staffing
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Others
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Financial
FY21 revenue grew 36% to $590M after four years of low growth.
Professional recruitment recovered to $94M after a drop in FY20 due to Covid-19 pandemic. Flexible staffing jumped 38% to $492M as firms restart hiring to replace massive job losses during the pandemic.
Gross margin held steady at 29.6%.
Singapore revenue grew 32% with marginal GM recovery to 23.7%. North Asia revenue jumped 43% on weaker GM of 45.2%.
RoA revenue spiked up 103% but GM fell sharply from 39.8% to 27.1%
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Open World
South East Asia countries are beginning to reopen her borders as sizeable number of citizens are vaccinated. This would translate to improving recruitment & staffing activities.
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Closed World
China, Japan borders are currently closed. Impact would likely be in the Professional recruitment sector involving expatriates. However for general flexible staffing, impact should be minimal since these economies are homogeneous favouring locals rather than foreign workers.
From 2022, China is expecting 10M employees to retire. State Council is planning to add 25M urban jobs by 2025.
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Opinion
Professional recruitment business from 2016~2021, signal that HRnetGroup may be facing headwind in this sector. The next year or two will indicate if this is the case and not due to pandemic impact.
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For flexible staffing, China 5-Years economic plan should sustain labour growth. As for Singapore, it is uncertain if the sharp revenue growth in FY21 is a one-off or a trend.