JobLeads launches B2C portfolio and receives additional growth capital

JobLeads met its profitability threshold at the end of 2010, prompting investors and management to provide the company with additional growth equity: around one million euros will be invested in marketing and B2C activities, an area in which the company has successfully expanded recently.

The investors High-Tech Gründerfonds, Michael W. Schwetje, Andreas Hanitsch and Jan Andresen, together with the company management, provided the firm with around one million euros as part of a further financing round. The extra capital will be used to develop B2B and B2C marketing activities in particular.

In the B2B sector, JobLeads helps businesses and recruitment consultants to identify highly qualified skilled employees and managerial staff for their senior positions. JobLeads currently achieves significant double-digit monthly growth rates in this area. “We want to maintain this growth and develop JobLeads’ market position even further, so we are going to expand our sales team and significantly invest in our marketing activities for the first time ever,” said Martin Schmidt, founder and Managing Director of JobLeads.

In the past few months, JobLeads has also been operating in the B2C sector, providing skilled professionals and managerial staff with exclusive access to more than 20,000 preselected senior positions and access to Germany’s leading headhunters for a monthly fee.  “Progress during these first few months clearly exceeded our expectations and has shown that we are on the right track. We are already the second biggest operator in this sector after experteer and we plan to invest further in expanding our position,” said Christian von Ahlen, founder and Managing Director of JobLeads.

Michael W. Schwetje, CEO of betafabrik GmbH, said, “The JobLeads team successfully steered the company through the economic crisis and has demonstrated impressive growth rates over the past six months. I am pleased to provide further support for this expansion, along with the other shareholders and the company management.”

About JobLeads
With over 100,000 carefully selected members, JobLeads is Germany’s biggest premium online career portal for jobs with an annual salary of EUR 50,000 and above. Businesses and recruiters can use financial incentives to encourage the high-calibre JobLeads community to recommend job vacancies to suitable candidates and so gain access to candidates who are not actively seeking a job. Qualified professional and managerial staff can actively plan their next career move with JobLeads. JobLeads provides registered members with access to the premium jobs market with more than 20,000 preselected senior positions and an exclusive network of over 1,000 vetted and approved recruiters.

Contact:
Christian von Ahlen
Managing Director
Klein Fontenay 1
20354 Hamburg
Phone: +49 40 441953-100
Fax: +49 40 441953-129
christian.vonahlen@jobleads.de
www.jobleads.de

About Michael W. Schwetje
Prior to founding betafabrik, Michael W. Schwetje built up a range of business models including content-oriented portals, technology-driven solutions and web-based services in both the B2B and B2C sectors. The result is a number of well-known Internet firms such as Onvista, Ligatus and Onmedia, which continue to operate successfully in the market today and demonstrate robust company valuations.

Contact:
betafabrik GmbH
Siegburger Straße 215
50679 Köln
Phone: +49 221-998966-0
Fax: +49 221-998966-99
info@betafabrik.de
www.betafabrik.de

About High-Tech Gründerfonds
High-Tech Gründerfonds invests venture capital in promising technology companies that turn innovative concepts into viable businesses. Seed financing aims to help start-ups guide their innovation to the prototype or proof-of-concept stage or to market launch. High-Tech Gründerfonds provides seed financing of approximately €500,000. It supports high-tech companies by way of its investment managers and its highly-qualified network of coaches, investors and specialists. In individual cases it can invest up to a total of €2 m per company. The investors in this public private partnership are the German Federal Ministry for Business and Technology, the KfW Banking Group as well as the six industrial groups of BASF, Deutsche Telekom, Siemens, Robert Bosch, Daimler and Carl Zeiss. High-Tech Gründerfonds has an investment volume totalling approx. €272 m.

Contact:
High-Tech Gründerfonds Management GmbH
Clemens von Bergmann
Investment Director
Ludwig-Erhard-Allee 2
53175 Bonn
Germany
Phone: +49 228 823001-00
Fax: +49 228 823000-50
c.bergmann@high-tech-gruenderfonds.de
www.high-tech-gruenderfonds.de