TRA Group Expanding to Take Advantage of Flat Earth Business Climate
Announcement posted by TRA Group 23 May 2007
Taking advantage of the current global increase in demand for highly skilled talent, TRA Australia, a national ICT recruitment services organisation, today announced a round of mergers, acquisitions and restructuring that positions the company as one of the largest privately own technology recruiters and staff management firms in Australia.
TRA has assumed ownership of well-respected recruitment services firms JKM in
TRA has a team of over 70 skilled staff meeting clients’ contract, permanent and executive IT staffing needs and has an estimated annual turnover exceeding $120 million. This turnover is set to grow exponentially as TRA Group takes advantage of new economies of scale to further increase its organic growth while continuing to target complimentary businesses for acquisition.
“Our companies have had a close working association for many years so it made perfect sense for JKM and VTR to join forces, creating a new powerhouse in the IT recruitment services market with experience beyond even the most established and sizeable players,” commented Teubler. “Our scale, broader geographic reach, extraordinarily talented staff and new solutions capacity, in combination with our existing capabilities, enable TRA to deliver second to none recruitment services to our clients and candidates.”
As part of this significant business realignment TRA Group has also announced its expansion into
“It is a move that will help clients and candidates access opportunities in what is increasingly being referred to as a ‘flat earth’ business climate,” Teubler said.
“The flat earth concept relates to the increasing global movement of the workforce – and work, for that matter – particularly in the IT industry where technical skills are totally transferable.
“The regional powerhouse economies of and are fine examples, both concurrently being massive users and sources of IT skills. Whether we are servicing clients or candidates, we need direct reach into these massive regional markets, hence our expansion into regional hubs.
Teubler adds, “Australian IT professionals have few barriers to working in other markets like
Julian Moss is leading the push into
“The opportunities for TRA, as well as our candidate base, in
“There are endless opportunities both locally and abroad for skilled talent, but it’s a matter of changing the candidate mindset from looking locally to one of realising that the global market is there to be explored. Candidates need to exploit this situation to build a solid career in IT, not just maintain a comfortable position in their home state or country if the opportunities they want and need are best found elsewhere in the region..”
Managed Vendor Solutions
In addition to announcing the new company structure, TRA today also announces the acquisition of MVS Australia (MVS), a market-leading vendor management business. The acquisition uniquely positions TRA as a provider of broader recruitment services to corporate clients.
The underlying MVS software provides various end-to-end recruitment supply chain management solutions including a fully integrated candidate management system, offering corporate clients and suppliers a fully transparent procurement platform for recruitment process management. MVS solutions are available through a traditional business process outsourcing model, as a hosted ASP solution or via software licensing. .
Commenting on the MVS acquisition, Teubler stated: “For recruitment firms to evolve, they must seek new ways to add value above and beyond the traditional find-and-place model. Recruitment process management solutions help achieve this, as they have a proven ability to generate significant efficiencies and cost savings for users.
“Whilst we will maintain MVS as wholly owned subsidiary of the group, there is no better way to prove the ‘vendor independence’ of our recruitment process management solutions than allowing open access to our solutions across the industry,” Teubler added, stating that major supply chain and recruitment firms are already lining up to explore gaining hosted ASP access to the MVS solutions for their clients, with several partnership agreements already completed.
Contractor Management Services
Another unique element of the new TRA structure is the upcoming launch of Traction Contractor Management, a first for a top-tier recruitment organisation. Usually provided by independent “umbrella companies”, management firms essentially seek to provide independent contractors with some of the benefits of permanent employment, such as salary packaging. Traction takes the concept to a far more sophisticated level than the usual approach of merely handling salary packaging. The service encompasses full payroll administration services but also focuses on wealth creation, career management and lifestyle benefits for the broader community of people operating as contractors.
“Contractors, IT and otherwise, have historically lacked support around whole of life wealth creation and career development that is enjoyed by permanent employees in large corporations,” commented Teubler. “TRA treats contractors like the vital part of the workforce they are, allowing contractors to reach beyond payroll services and get the very most out of their contracting careers.”
TRA Group Management
The TRA Group management team is one of the most experienced in the recruitment sector, consisting of:
- Julian Moss – Executive Chairman
-
Vincent Teubler – Chief Executive Officer -
Martyn Dominy – Chief Financial Officer - Andrew Cassin – Director, Corporate Development
- Lara Tinkler – Manager, Shared Services
- Vesna Kebakoska – National Operations Manager
- Paul Davila –
NSW State - Owen Bleakly -
Victorian State - Kevin Potter – Manager, Asian Operations