Our Value Creation - Evolving with the Times
Recruit Group was launched in 1960 in a small prefabricated rooftop unit in Tokyo. The Group's first product was a job-hunting magazine for university students called "Invitations to Companies," and its goal was to create an open job market for new graduates by widely disclosing recruitment information. 2020 marks the 60th anniversary of Recruit Group's founding. In those 60 years, we've brought individuals and companies together through a variety of services and solutions that span across the world.
Recruit Group is known for reaching beyond the boundaries of our business and industry in search of ways to solve problems in the world through optimal matching. As society continues to change, Recruit Group's mission remains the same: to create "Opportunities for Life" by prioritizing social value, delivering information to those who need it with speed and convenience, and providing opportunities for everyone to discover the best choices for themselves. We strive to create value by nurturing the potential of each individual and betting on the will and passion of curious minds to correct disadvantages in the world.
Today, in the face of unprecedented change, our mission is more relevant than ever and our services and solutions are constantly evolving to become faster, simpler, and more accessible. As we celebrate our 60th anniversary, we have traced Recruit Group's history of value creation along three axes: business field expansion, digital transformation, and globalization.
Business field expansion
We first established ourselves in the field of university newspaper advertising, before developing our two-sided marketplace business model in 1962, which continues to guide us today. Since then, we have widened our range of HR businesses, while also expanding into the life events field, including housing, automobiles, bridal, and the lifestyle field including travel, dining, and beauty. Recently, we have introduced software as a service ("SaaS") business tools to support operations within small and medium-sized enterprises ("SMEs"), such as retailers and restaurants.
Digital transformation
The Company began using computers at a time when their use was still limited, putting digitization into practice for increased efficiency. Following the introduction of a supercomputer in the 1980s, we transitioned from paper magazines to online media in the 1990s, and then to mobile platforms. Not only did this allow for faster and more convenient delivery of information, but it also transformed how individual users and business clients interact, through the development of groundbreaking tools such as online reservation systems. Today we continue the evolution of digital solutions through the development of SaaS solutions.
Globalization
In the 2000s, the Company entered the global market with a bridal business in China. Although this ended with a withdrawal, this experience helped us to shape our mergers and acquisitions ("M&A") strategy, and we later succeeded in expanding our staffing businesses to the US, Europe, Australia and beyond. Further, the acquisitions of Indeed, Inc. in 2012 and Glassdoor, Inc. in 2018 have led to the successful establishment of our HR Technology SBU, spearheading the growth of the Company as a whole and bringing the number of countries we serve to over 60.
March 1960Foundation. Started as an advertising agency specializing in job ads in university newspapers.
Invitation to Companies
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IBM 1130
Introduced the IBM 1130 Computing System, becoming the first company in Japan to use this groundbreaking computer.
Recruit Computer Print
Established Recruit Computer Print, a company specializing in digitized pre-production processes focused on adopting leading edge publishing technologies.
Housing Information
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Travail
Launched Travail, Japan's first career change magazine for women, published 5 years prior to Japan's legislative enactment of The Equal Employment Opportunity Law.
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Car Sensor
Launched the magazine Car Sensor. It was born from a training program for new employees and focused on the used car market.
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Launched Information Network Service
Against the backdrop of the privatization of Japan's telecommunication industry, launched Information Network Service operations and Remote Computing Service operations. Hired many engineers.
Recruit U.S.A.
Established Recruit U.S.A. to support Japanese companies with local hiring in the US.
Supercomputer Research Institute
Established Supercomputer Research Institute, aimed at developing insights into how to meet the challenges and opportunities of the approaching era of a datadriven society.
Jalan
Launched Jalan, a magazine about travel and leisure optimized for easier booking.
Zexy
Launched Zexy, a bridal information magazine born from our new internal business proposal system, "Ring."
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Mix Juice (now ISIZE)
Launched Mix Juice (Currently ISIZE) marking the start of our online media business.
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Launched today's Rikunabi and Rikunabi NEXT
Digitized our job information magazines and launched RB on the NET (Currently Rikunabi) and Digital B-ing (Currently Rikunabi Next).
Hot Pepper (now Hot Pepper Gourmet)
Launched Travail, Japan's first career change magazine for women, published 5 years prior to Japan's legislative enactment of The Equal Employment Opportunity Law.
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Launched ISIZE TRAVEL(now Jalan.net)
Launched ISIZE TRAVEL(now Jalan.net) a platform for making accommodation reservations online.
Launched the bridal information magazine Zexy in China
Launched the bridal information magazine Zexy in China. This experience helped the Company shape M&A strategy for global expansion.
Hot Pepper Beauty
Launched Hot Pepper Beauty, an online beauty salon appointment reservation service.
Acquired US-based staffing company, The CSI Companies
Acquired US-based staffing company, The CSI Companies, Inc. and implemented our Unit Management System. With this acquisition, we began M&A-driven global expansion.
Juken Sapuri (now Study Sapuri)
Launched Juken Sapuri (Currently Study Sapuri), an online learning service for college entrance exams, then expanded into languages and other subjects, successfully growing into an affordable high-quality online learning platform.
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Acquired staffmark, Advantage Resourcing
Acquired Staffmark Group, LLC in October, Advantage Resourcing Europe B.V. in December and expanded our staffing business in the US and Europe.
SALON BOARD
Developed SALON BOARD, a cloud-based online reservation management system that improves operational efficiency at beauty salons through digitization, replacing paper-based reservation books.
Acquired Indeed
Acquired Indeed, Inc. (founded in 2004), a job search engine based in the US. This marked our full entry into the HR technology business, which has since revolutionized the HR industry through disruptive digital innovation.
AirREGI
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2014Listed publicly on the First Section of the Tokyo Stock Exchange
AirPAY
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Recruit Institute of Technology (now Megagon Labs)
Established Recruit Institute of Technology (Currently Megagon Labs) to work with external organizations on research and development of AI, machine learning, and other new technologies.
Acquired the staffing companies Chandler Macleod and Peoplebank
Acquired the staffing companies Peoplebank Australia Ltd in January and Chandler Macleod Group Limited in April, companies with leading market positions and strong business fundamentals in the Australian market.
Recruit Finance Partners
Established Recruit Finance Partners. Reinforced our expansion into the management support domain by providing loans to SMEs.
Fintech Promotion Division
Established a Fintech Promotion Division and launched digital innovation efforts in the financial industry.
Launched Indeed Hire
An innovative service that goes beyond the existing advertisement business in the financial industry.
Acquired USG People (now RGF Staffing)
Acquired USG People Holdings B.V. (Currently RGF Staffing B.V.), a leading European staffing company with a presence in the Netherlands, France, Germany, and Belgium among other countries, marking our full entry into Europe.
AirSHIFT
Launched AirSHIFT, a system for the management of shift work using a SaaS solution, thereby contributing to operational efficiency in the service industry where labor shortages are a major problem.
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Acquired Glassdoor
Acquired Glassdoor, a leading online job and company information site founded in 2007. Glassdoor has developed a database of information and reviews posted by users, bringing transparency to the job seeking process and strengthening our HR Technology business.
Launched Indeed Assessments
Launched Indeed Assessments. Continued to introduce new services that improve efficiency in the recruiting and hiring process.
Air BusinessTools
Aggregated our business and management support services for small and medium enterprises, including AirREGI and AirPAY. Accelerated the expansion of our SaaS solutions using the cloud. Strengthened the development of new solutions for improving operational efficiency in stores.
Indeed Interview
Launched Indeed Interview, a video interviewing platform designed specifically for interviewing and hiring, which was created to allow employers to quickly adapt to virtual hiring needs during the pandemic so job seekers could interview safely from the convenience of their homes.
Indeed Hiring Platform
Launched Indeed Hiring Platform, a new solution that allows employers to manage the hiring process - from posting through interview - directly on Indeed, with no additional software. Job seekers who meet an employers' objective job criteria can automatically advance to an interview.
1962
Published Invitation to Companies which consolidated recruitment information for university students and established the two-sided marketplace business model.
1976
Launched operations in the housing information industry in response to the oil crisis induced recession, and achieved rapid growth.
1980
Launched Travail, Japan's first career change magazine for women, published 5 years prior to Japan's legislative enactment of The Equal Employment Opportunity Law.
1984
Launched the magazine Car Sensor. It was born from a training program for new employees and focused on the used car market.
1985
Against the backdrop of the privatization of Japan's telecommunications industry, launched Information Network Service operations and Remote Computing Service operations.
1993
Launched Zexy, a bridal information magazine born from our new internal business proposal system, "Ring."
2000
While the Company expanded its businesses in the field of life events such as housing and bridal, it also launched lifestyle information magazine Hot Pepper (Currently Hot Pepper Gourmet) which contains dining guides and coupons.
2011
Launched Juken Sapuri (Currently Study Sapuri), an online learning service for college entrance exams, then expanded into languages and other subjects, successfully growing into an affordable high-quality online learning platform.
2013
Released AirREGI, a point of sale (POS) system for SMEs of various industries such as retailers and restaurants, using smartphones and tablets to enhance operational efficiency of their businesses.
2015
Expanded the functions of AirREGI and launched AirPAY, a payment system service that can handle various payment methods including credit cards, electronic money, and QR Codes1.
1 "QR Code" is a registered trademark of DENSO WAVE INCORPORATED.
2018
Launched AirSHIFT, a system for the management of shift work using a SaaS solution, thereby contributing to operational efficiency in the service industry where labor shortages are a major problem.
1995
Launched Mix Juice (Currently ISIZE) marking the start of our online media business.
