SINGAPORE - The Competition Commission of Singapore (CCS) is seeking public feedback on a move by the world's largest online jobs website to buy a Malaysian rival. Australia-based Seek, through its majority-owned unit Seek Asia Investments, plans to buy JobStreet for RM1.73 billion (S$683 million).
The CCS has called for feedback on terms proposed by Seek and Seek Asia to address concerns that the deal might stifle competition. The public can give feedback at www.ccs.gov.sg, under the section Public Register and Consultation. The deadline is Sept 5. The CCS will then decide on whether to accept the proposed terms and approve the deal, which involves Seek Asia acquiring 100 per cent of the Kuala Lumpur-based company.
The proposed terms include preventing Seek and Seek Asia from entering into exclusive agreements with the employer and recruiter customers. This is aimed at retaining the current practice of utilising more than one online recruitment advertising service platform by employers, recruiters and job seekers. Seek and Seek Asia would also have to keep the pricing of their services capped at current levels, subject to inflation, to address concerns that the merger could result in prices of online recruitment advertising services increasing.
These terms would apply for three years from the date of completion of the merger.
Seek already owns 22 per cent of JobStreet, which runs recruitment portal JobStreet Singapore.
Both companies notified the CCS of the proposed merger - the first here involving online recruitment firms - on Feb 20 as it could have competition implications. Seek plans to combine JobStreet with JobsDB, its other majority-owned Asian online jobs business spanning Hong Kong, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand.
With the acquisition, Seek hopes to expand into Asian markets. JobStreet posts more than 150,000 advertisements a month and has a database of more than 11 million job seekers in Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, the Philippines and Vietnam.
This article was first published on August 22, 2014.
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