Dice has bought its way into the health care job market, acquiring AllHealthcarejobs.com for cash and stock worth about $3.76 million.
Announced today, the purchase is the first for the company since 2006 when it acquired eFinancialCareers and JobsintheMoney. Those acquisitions, earlier ones of the security job site ClearanceJobs.com, and Targeted Job Fairs, and now AllHealthcarejobs, are part of Dice Holdings’ long-term diversification strategy.
“Through this acquisition, we continue to execute our strategic plan which includes pursuing growth opportunities in new verticals,” says Scot Melland, chairman, president, and CEO of Dice Holdings, Inc. “Today, Dice gains a successful career site in healthcare, an important industry sector facing long-term shortages of experienced professionals in critical areas.”
Healthcare has been the only sector to see consistent, if slow, growth during the recession that began last year. Adding a niche site with broad reach will help Dice Holdings offset revenue losses in its two biggest job boards, tech site Dice.com, and eFinancialCareers.com. Its powerhouse site, Dice.com, accounts for three-quarters of the company’s revenue and is its biggest traffic driver. eFinancialCareers produces 19 percent of the company’s revenue.
Heavy dependence on tech jobs drove Dice into bankruptcy after the market crash of 2001. It rose from the ashes as a private company and began diversifying in 2004 before going public again in 2007. Now, the contraction of the finance and banking sectors and the slump in tech hiring have combined to push overall revenues down to $29.6 million for the first quarter of 2009, a 25 percent drop over the same period last year. eFinancialCareers revenues alone are down by 40 percent to $5.9 million. Dice.com saw a 19 percent decrease in first quarter revenue to $22 million.
Even so, cost cutting and frugal management gave Dice Holdings a first quarter profit of $3.9 million or 6 cents a share, the same per share earnings the company posted in Q1 2008.
The healthcare jobs acquisition gives Dice a foothold in a market that is expected to continue growing as aging Baby Boomers retire, opening up positions while also requiring more medical care. AllHealthcarejobs itself has seen steady growth in traffic over the last year, according to both Compete and Alexa. Since it’s a private company, revenues are not reported; however, the site today claims almost 30,000 listings and about 272,000 registered users.
Besides the obvious growth, Dice also can see synergies with its other sites — medical tech job placements on Dice, for instance — that can boost revenues, while operational consolidation can cut some costs.
“We are confident that we can further drive AllHealthcareJobs.com growth through our expertise in building communities and serving customers,” Melland says in the press release announcing the deal.
Of the total price, $2.8 million is in cash. Another $959,400 (at Wednesday’s closing price of $4.68 a share) is in restricted stock. Up to $1.0 million in cash is payable upon the achievement of certain undisclosed operating and financial goals over the next two years.
Phil Morris, co-founder and president of AllHealthcarejobs, and his wife and co-founder Julie Morris, will continue to run the website.
