Alma Career becomes a shareholder in HR service technology company Bolt Group

Alma Media Corporation                            Press release 17 December 2020

ALMA CAREER BECOMES A SHAREHOLDER IN HR SERVICE TECHNOLOGY COMPANY BOLT GROUP

Alma Career, a subsidiary of Alma Media and specialised in recruitment business, has acquired 21.05 per cent of the share capital of Bolt Group Ltd, a technology company that specialises in staffing services through a directed share issue. The parties have agreed not to disclose the price of the transaction.

Bolt Group, established in 2016, offers staffing and related digital services for construction, industry, logistics, property maintenance and the HoReCa sector. Bolt Group currently has operations in 14 locations all around Finland, with 50,000 registered users on its mobile application and 4,500 corporate clients. According to statistics published by the Private Employment Agencies Association (HPL), Bolt Group is the 10th biggest staffing agency in Finland. The company’s estimated turnover in 2020 is around EUR 40 million. Bolt Group employs 85 people.

The aim of Bolt Group is to rethink and renew the traditional staffing operating models and use digitalisation to enhance recruitment processes by applying technology and machine learning. The matches of right people for the right jobs are made in real time. The Bolt application acts as a material bank for the employee. For example, it contains the employment information, completed working hours, the employee guide, reviews of the employers and work safety instructions. Correspondingly, through the application the employer can flexibly optimise its labour resources and review employees’ professional skills, work experience and feedback and recommendations from past employers. As the employer, Bolt manages the payroll and any statutory notices.

According to Statistics Finland, the total turnover of Finnish staffing agencies in 2019 was approximately EUR 2.95 billion. Also, according to the Private Employment Agencies Association (HPL), the total turnover of the 20 biggest staffing operators in 2019 was approximately EUR 1.6 billion.

“In our strategy, we have previously focused on increasing job board advertising in white-collar jobs segment. The ownership in Bolt extends our operations in digital staffing industry, meets the market expectations of on-demand services for flexible workforce and strengthens our abilities to offer managed HR services. In our portfolio this investment also increases the amount of blue-collar vacancies in manufacturing and service sector” says Vesa-Pekka Kirsi, Director of the Alma Markets business unit.

“Our organic growth has been rapid, and we believe we can further accelerate our growth with strong partners. Alma will bring the support and strong competence we need for building public awareness and bring digitalisation to the job market. It is very important to us that we are fast in matching the labour force needs of employers – and extensive media visibility among employees is an advantage,” says Ville Herva, CEO of Bolt Group.

Alma Career is part of the Alma Media Group and operates in 11 European countries.

Further information:
Vesa-Pekka Kirsi, Director, Alma Markets, tel. +358 (0)10 665 2587
Ville Herva, CEO, Bolt Group, tel. +358 (0)40 575 6996

Alma Media in brief

Alma Media is a dynamic digital service business and media company with a strong capacity for renewal. The company’s best-known brands are Kauppalehti, Talouselämä, Iltalehti, Etuovi.com and Monster. Alma Media builds sustainable growth expanding its offering from media to related digital services fulfilling the needs of users’ everyday life as consumers and as professionals in business. Alma Media operates in 11 countries in Europe. Alma Media employs approximately 1,500 professionals. Alma Media’s revenue from continuing operations was EUR 250.2 million in 2019. Alma Media’s share is listed on NASDAQ Helsinki. Read more at www.almamedia.com 

Share article