The future is worry-free, and the return is the right way?

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If there is no far-sighted worry, there must be near-term worry?

According to public information, 51job is an online integrated human resources service provider, founded in 1998, successfully listed on the NASDAQ in the United States in September 2004, becoming the first Chinese resource service enterprise listed on the US stock market.

But what I didn't expect was that the delisting of 51Job was a series of twists and turns, and the agreement that was expected to be completed in the second half of 2021 was unexpectedly postponed. On November 8, 2021, 511, 51job 1Job issued an announcement explaining the reasons for the delay, saying that regulatory policy changes had an impact on companies and privatization transactions. Subsequently, there were media reports that the buyer group used this to reduce the purchase price.

Unexpectedly, it was not until the beginning of March 2022 that another boot of 51job Privatization finally landed.

According to the financial report data, the total revenue of 51job in the third quarter of 2021 was 1.0184 billion yuan, an increase of 19.3% year-on-year; the net profit of the online recruitment business revenue was 46.6 million yuan, an increase of 17.8% year-on-year, and the net profit in the third quarter of non-GAAP was 134.9 million yuan.

According to Ma Xiaowei, a practitioner in the online recruitment industry, this is because labor costs have become the biggest revenue stumbling block for Future Worry-free, and the online recruitment platform that has been used as an example of Future Worry-free generally adopts two ways of system review and manual review, and manual review is the last hurdle of system review If the system audit misses the illegal information, the manual audit will be directly intercepted, but if it is very difficult to do without omission, otherwise it will not cause the occurrence of the "58 Blood Slave Incident", if you want to reduce the audit loopholes, only the heap manpower, In this way, the corresponding cost will also increase, which may be the biggest reason why the future worry-free increase does not increase profits.

However, from the perspective of advertising expenses alone, it has increased from 58.6 million yuan in the same period last year to 130.8 million yuan, which is really quite scary. Ma Xiaowei analyzed that this can confirm the fierce competition in the online recruitment industry from the side, a large amount of burning money to advertise is a common disease in the industry, the market is advertised out, and the current predicament of Future Worry-free does not dare to reduce this part of the expenditure.

The industry is fiercely competitive, and the future-proof operating profit margin can be glimpsed. According to the financial report, the operating income of 51job in the third quarter of 2020 was 175 million yuan, while the operating income in the third quarter of 2021 was only 129.7 million yuan; the operating profit margin (operating income as a proportion of net income) in the third quarter of 2021 was 12.0%, reaching 19.3% in the same period of 2020, and if the stock-based compensation expense is excluded, the gap is even greater, 14.9% in the third quarter of 2021 and 23.0% in the same period of 2020.

Ma Xiaowei analyzed that this shows the three problems facing 51job, the first industry competition is fierce, the revenue and profit of the main business of recruitment are declining; the second is making money more and more difficult, in order to cope with the competition and the derived expenses are increasing, profits are declining; the third policy risk is increasing, the third quarterly report of 51job is in the "Network Security Review Measures" and other provisions of the intensive introduction of the period, which is bound to have an impact on the development of business, but now the future of how to break through, the strategy is still unclear.

In addition, the cash flow of 51job has also changed significantly. According to the financial report, as of September 30, 2021, the total cash and short-term investment was 10.1694 billion yuan, while as of December 31, 2020, the total cash and short-term investment was 107.619 billion yuan, that is to say, in less than a year, the cash flow of 100 billion yuan was missing.

Move forward with risk

The online recruitment track has long been crowded, and new platforms are constantly being squeezed in.

In contrast, one of 51job's main competitors, Boss's direct employment of enterprise users (especially paying users) is growing, according to boss direct employment financial report, as of September 30, 2021, the total number of BOSS direct paying enterprise customers reached 4 million. Its prospectus also details that the number of paid corporate customers increased by 80.1% year-on-year from 1.24 million in 2019 to 2.23 million in 2020.

A large number of market share is being eroded by competitors, ciccumbed in the "Human Resources Industry Special Report" pointed out that only a large number of job application resources platform can no longer meet the current market demand, can achieve business vertical and detailed service of the recruitment platform competitiveness can be further improved.

Industry practitioner Ma Xiaowei pointed out that because of the high cost, the conversion rate is not high and the profit is not high, the profit model of the Internet recruitment industry is known as "the poor student of the Internet", in this case, the platform such as 51job has to face fierce competition from the industry, if you want to stand out in the industry, the primary task may not be technology or resources, and more may be a deeper understanding of its own "differentiation".

In addition, if you want to do a good job in Internet recruitment, it is not simply to expand the business scope, and the online recruitment platform also faces some uncertain risk factors for job seekers and enterprises.

2021 CCTV "3 ·15 party" can be said to be a watershed in the development of the online recruitment industry, this party will be the first time the issue of data security on the table, especially a detail in the party, there is a recruitment platform resume was resold everywhere for 7 yuan, which makes the market and regulators very worried about the leakage of personal information and potential data transaction risks, what use of these personal information, and where it will eventually flow is unknown. It attracted the attention of regulators, and then triggered a series of data security regulations and regulations in 2021.

Ma Xiaowei, a practitioner in the industry, pointed out that for the future of worry-free to pull the new is the top priority, but the current industry common problem is that the cost of pulling new is getting higher and higher, and the user stickiness is getting worse and worse, in the face of enterprise users, non-just need to pull new customers the cost is high, and the frequency of use is extremely low can not be converted into a charging customer, so in terms of user, customer information management on how to set the threshold has always been a headache problem, can not be set too high to block people out of the door, can not be set too low that will be a problem. Because of this, the recruitment industry is called a "thankless industry".

How can the future be worry-free?

Looking back on 2021, not only has it triggered a huge change in the online education industry, but also for the online recruitment industry. The external environment such as the US stock market is becoming more and more sinister, while the competition in the domestic industry tends to be white-hot, and regulatory review is also tightening.

This is not the most worrying thing for the market, the biggest concern comes from the regulatory policy risks that Internet recruitment companies have to face.

In July 2021, the regulator issued the Measures for Network Security Review, which clearly stipulates that if the personal information of users of online platforms exceeds 1 million, they must apply to the Network Security Review Office for network security review if they want to go overseas for listing. The Data Security Regulations, a supplementary regulation of November 2021, explicitly include the mergers and acquisitions and restructuring of Internet platforms and the listing in Hong Kong within the scope of security review.

This has far-reaching implications for online recruitment platforms, including 51job, which means that listing in the U.S. stock market will face an increase in the cost of listing compliance, in addition to data security becoming a potential "thunder".

The online recruitment industry has already learned from the past, and Boss Direct Employment has triggered a series of security reviews due to its listing in the US stock market, which eventually led to the suspension of all new user registrations. Some media even pessimistically believe that the business of the online recruitment platform is inseparable from the addition of newly registered users, so that enterprises will have the motivation to retain and pay, if they can no longer continue to register new users, only job changers on the platform instead of job seekers, activity may plummet.

Cybersecurity issues are not only related to online recruitment platforms, but even affect the travel, freight and cross-border Internet brokerage industries, and information security issues have become a top priority for regulators to make their position clear.

Zhaopin, which went public in the United States in 2014, is also the earliest batch of recruitment websites in China, preparing for nearly 20 years to go public in the United States, and finally choosing to delist only three years after the listing, during which its stock price has long hovered at a low level of $11 to $19 per share. Reluctantly, in 2017, he signed an acquisition agreement and sold all his shares in cash at a premium of $4 per share, becoming a private enterprise.

In 2020, 58.com, a part of its online recruitment business, was also delisted from the U.S. stock market, and in September 2020, 58.com announced its decision to privatize, completed a merger with Quantum Bloom Company Ltd, and was acquired and privatized at a valuation of $8.7 billion.

However, Tongdao Liepin and BOSS Direct Recruitment face the same problems as 51job, and the data security problems they face cannot be underestimated. Especially at the CCTV "3.15 Evening Party" in 2021, Liepin publicly named and criticized because the resumes of job seekers were illegally sold, and in April 2021, boss direct employment was questioned by the media with the slogan "Looking for a job, I want to talk to the boss" Suspected advertising fraud, the media pointed out that the boss claimed by boss direct employment is not worthy of the name, most of which is the company's HR.

There are fewer and fewer listed companies on online recruitment platforms, and the demands of users for personal information protection are becoming more and more intense, and regulators are constantly tightening the mouth of data security reviews, leaving liester and BOSS direct employment time to seriously think about where to go in the future.

Industry insiders pointed out that the delisting of online recruitment platforms such as 5job is actually not a bad thing in the absolute sense, in the long run, once the privatization is completed, there may be new capital injections, so that enterprises can better integrate existing resources, adjust business direction, and win breathing time in highly competitive industries.

In addition, industry insiders also pointed out that companies like 51job should still focus on the domestic human resources market, because enterprises with huge demand are still in China after all, and it is a good thing to return to the local area.

The analysis pointed out that unlike big data in other industries, the big data object of human resources focuses on individuals, and in the process of data use and analysis, it is easier to produce the leakage of personal information or even a crisis to the national information security, and the country is most concerned about big data can not be controlled by the us stock law to be audited, and human resources-related business is particularly sensitive. Especially in the context of the current changes in the international situation, Internet companies can also gain trust and support from the regulator after their return. For the entire human resources industry, data protection is a red line, but data protection and personal information security require the joint efforts of the state and enterprises.

2021 is the beginning of the 14th Five-Year Plan, the State Council and the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security and other central organs have successively issued relevant policies to ensure the employment of talents, and in the same year, the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security also issued the "Regulations on the Management of Online Recruitment Services", which guided the standardized and sustainable development of Internet recruitment platforms, and the online recruitment industry will move towards a new era of more standardized and more secure information in the future.