Job recruitment company, Jobberman has announced the acquisition of Ngcareers.com, Nigeria’s foremost career and recruitment platform.
The acquisition was completed in an undisclosed deal that saw Jobberman acquire 100% of Ngcareers.com.
According to NGcareers, the acquisition was necessary to allow them provide a wider array of services and more depth.
Founded by Andrew Eze and Paul Eze in 2009, Ngcareers is a recruitment platform in Nigeria connecting professionals and jobseekers to the latest job opportunities.
Since its launch, the company has grown from a few hundred users to more to have more than a million users in Nigeria as of last year.
The deal will see Jobberman’s parent company, ROAM Africa (Ringier One Africa Media), take full control of the company and consolidate its dominance on the Nigerian career marketplace space.
CEO of Jobberman Nigeria, Hilda Kabushenga Kragha shared that the deal will further drive both company’s interests in the long run.
“Ngcareers is one of the top job portals in Nigeria. With this acquisition, we have the opportunity to widen our scope in Nigeria and show our long-term commitment to the market. It will give us a stronger, bigger platform and enable us to create better digital services for our customers,”
Hilda Kabushenga Kragha, CEO of Jobberman Nigeria
Jobberman is expanding
Like NGcareers, Jobberman was also founded in 2009. Since its launch, the job recruitment company has grown to become one of the largest recruitment platforms in sub-Saharan Africa.
The company’s growth follows its initial merger with Ringier Africa in 2015 before it was later acquired in 2017 by One Africa Media (OAM), one of Africa’s largest digital publishers.
The acquisition expanded Jobberman’s footprint as the group now has over 13 businesses across Africa including Jobberman Ghana, the Brighter Monday Job platforms in East Africa and now, NGcareers.
Job recruitment in Nigeria
In Nigeria alone, Jobberman has over 2.5 million registered job seekers actively looking for jobs posted by more than 65,000 employers. However, the company is looking to expand with the new acquisition.
This follows the initial 70% drop in job listings due to the reduced economic activity caused by the pandemic.
“At the beginning of March, Jobberman Nigeria saw a 70 percent decrease in job listings due to the reduced economic activity caused by the enforced lockdown and many companies shutting down recruitment budgets to cut costs. Jobseeker sign-ups also decreased by 17 percent. Jobberman took the bold step to put employers’ and job seekers’ needs first” the company revealed in a statement
Although Jobberman reported a bounce back with a 183% increase in job listings in April after allowing employers post jobs for free, the model is not sustainable as they are losing their major source of income.
The latest acquisition will help bolster the company’s revenue inflow as it continues to help Nigerians get job placements.
Jobber also recently partnered with Microsoft to launched a free soft skills training programme to help job seekers (between age 18 and 30 years) acquire the needed soft skills and better their chances of gaining employment.
Following the completion of the deal, both companies will continue as independent companies under the parent company, ROAM Africa, but the company says the goal is for both to become Jobberman.com.
Together both companies will also continue to helped bridge the unemployment gap that has been widened due to the pandemic.