The video opens with Adeline Sim welcoming shareholders to HRnetGroup’s first virtual AGM and outlining the company’s core business: Flexible Staffing (RecruitExpress, RecruitFirst) and Professional Recruitment. She explains that flexible staffing provides essential services across sectors such as healthcare, IT, finance, logistics and retail, while professional recruitment supplies transformation and digital‑marketing talent. The group’s revenue is geographically diversified, with 49% coming from outside Singapore across 13 Asian cities, notably Mainland China, which is performing better than Singapore during the pandemic. Adeline highlights the company’s digital backbone—self‑check‑in (Knock Knock), remote contract signing (Ally), candidate verification (Candid), contract execution (HelloTOS), and real‑time feedback (Heartbeats)—which allowed rapid work‑from‑home transition and continuity of operations. She mentions employee‑centric initiatives such as “Save a Job, Save a Family”, “Come Walk With Me”, and the Jobsaver Award, aimed at supporting contractors and clients during the downturn. CFO Jennifer Kang then presents FY2019 financial results: S$423.1 million revenue, S$55.8 million net income (+6.4%), gross profit of S$145 million (down 6.3%), and a proposed dividend of S$28.2 million (2.8 cents per share, 5.4% yield). The dividend policy remains a 50% payout of net profit after tax. She details the contribution split (Singapore 51% of GP, North Asia 46%) and notes that the flexible staffing segment generated 33% of GP and employed roughly 12,000 contractors. Operationally, the group remained 100% functional across all cities during COVID‑19, with remote work in Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Jakarta, Tokyo and phased office re‑openings elsewhere. The presentation then addresses non‑controlling investments: Starflight’s board restructuring, and long‑term strategic intent for Staffline and Bambooz, emphasizing dialogue with their boards to enhance shareholder value. Finally, a speaker outlines the group’s amplified social‑media presence (LinkedIn, WeChat, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok) and content strategy, while a Group Business Leader (Catherine) introduces HRnetOne in Singapore and Thailand. The session closes with thanks and an invitation to reconnect in person next year.
Chapters
Good morning, and thank you all for joining us for our very first virtual AGM. To start with, Let's go back to what exactly is our business and where we make our money. That is always a question from new shareholders, but because of the highly unusual circumstances we are all in, it is important for everyone here to be clear about what we do and where we do it. What we do. We have two primary products. Flexible Staffing and Professional Recruitment. Our Flexible Staffing brands are RecruitExpress and RecruitFirst, which have been classified as essential service providers in Singapore. This is because of the healthcare workers we have in hospitals, our IT contract staff with telecommunications providers, our banking contract staff in financial services, our guys in supermarkets, logistics hubs, food delivery companies, and more. Our services are essential for life to proceed. Our other product is professional recruitment. This is where we are helping companies hire transformation specialists, digital marketing experts, and other talents relevant for the future. Next, where do we make our money? Whilst the pandemic has left few economies unscathed, it is also true that some countries have handled the situation better than others. So if today, 100% of our business came from Singapore, we would definitely be a lot more nervous. We are lucky, however, that we spent the last 28 years building a web of offices across 13 cities in Asia. And today, 49% of our business comes from outside Singapore. Mainland China is definitely ahead of the curve in the COVID game, And sentiment in Shanghai is more positive than in Singapore, which is helpful for business. Having said that, it's going to be a very tough year. Internally, we are lucky that we were in the midst of regenerating our backbone with a digital sheath. So when the pandemic struck, one business unit after another started having to work from home We were able to accelerate our plans and implement measures, including moving thousands of contractor employees onto selfie check-ins and obtaining candidate declarations via mobile. We are fortunate we have been conscientiously working on and investing in technology, which is what is allowing parts of the world today to function somewhat normally. We have Knock Knock, which is our proprietary selfie check-in solution, which has geopositioning and geofencing capabilities, so clients are able to tell with certainty where the contractors are and approve timesheets on any device. Then we have Ally, which allows our consultants to trigger employment contracts remotely and contractor employees to upload bank and other required documents to formalise the employment relationship via digital signature. Candid allows job applicants to verify data and make relevant declarations from wherever they are and have the data fed automatically into our internal candidate management system. HelloTOS means our clients can execute contracts from anywhere with an internet connection. Even our training materials have gone online, with our sales handbook going digital too. Our Heartbeats feature means clients and candidates let us know in real time whether we have done well or if we can do better. And these are some actual heartbeats we received. The good feedback you are seeing came as a result of our business people working with heart and soul. And when faced with an environment where business is plummeting, acting with speed to roll out schemes like Save a Job, Save a Family to support candidates who found themselves thrown out of work, Come Walk With Me for our placement services, the Jobsaver Award, and many more initiatives to support our clients, contractor employees, and candidates. We are working to give companies insight into why this is a good time to pick up great talent and not to fire people out of panic and fear. HRNetGroup will stay ahead because we are constantly innovating and evolving, sensitive to the energies of the market and engaging with it. We also ensure we contribute to the communities in the countries we operate in, including in China, Singapore, Indonesia, Japan, and more. As market leaders in talent acquisition, we seek to cultivate and nurture talent wherever we go. So I hope in the last 10 minutes I've brought you on a virtual journey of what is going on in HRNetGroup. Because we are technically at our AGM for financial year 2019, we do have to go into some detail in relation to our financial performance. So let me hand you over at this point to our lovely CFO, Jennifer Kang, before we take your questions together thereafter. Jennifer, please.
Thank you, Adeline. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. We know that the 2019 results have panned out well for HRNetGroup, that even in the face of the trade war and economic challenges, especially in Singapore, Hong Kong, and Malaysia, we reported S$423.1 million in revenue, with 9 consecutive quarters in excess of the S$100 million mark, and an increase of 6.4% to S$55.8 million in net income. And very importantly to our dear shareholders, At a time when many companies, including our competitors, are withdrawing or cancelling dividends, we propose to declare the same quantum of dividend as the previous year, S$28.2 million, which translates to the same dividend of 2.8 cents per share. Based on yesterday's closing price of 52 cents, this translates to a yield of 5.4%. We have kept our practice, as announced at time of IPO, to distribute 50% of our net profit after tax. And this year, we are doing a payout of 50.6%. Operationally, we drive our business by gross profits. Last year's S$145 million saw a dip of 6.3%, out of which Singapore contributed 51% and North Asia, namely Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou, Suzhou, Tokyo, and Seoul, 46%. In 2020, across 13 cities, we have been 100% operational throughout this COVID-19 episode. Though where the various governments have mandated working from home, we have done so in accordance with our business continuity plans. Currently, our employees in Singapore, Kuala Lumpur, Bangkok, Jakarta, and Tokyo are all actively working from home with our rhythms of meetings, using our tech platforms, and generating results. My colleagues in cities such as Shanghai, Beijing, Guangzhou, Suzhou, Taipei, Hong Kong, and Seoul have progressively resumed business activities in the respective offices since 1st of March 2020. Our flexible staffing business generated 33% of our GP in 2019. The business volume is reflected in contractor employee numbers which averaged nearly 12,000 last year. This year, we have pioneering contributions from our RecruitFirst startup units in Kuala Lumpur, Taipei, and Shanghai. Singapore traditionally contributes the most in flexible staffing. During this Circuit Breaker period, our flexible staffing teams continue to service clients who are providing essential services such as healthcare and social services, information and communication services, banking and finance services, facilities management and critical public infrastructure, transportation and storage, online retail and related supply chain, food services, defence and security, and energy services. Our contractor employees are working very hard on the ground. The temperature reader, the social distancing enforcers, the supermarket stock refillers, packers, cashiers, and so on. Yes, we are also at the frontline for our fellow Singaporeans. As expected, flexible staffing tends to be more resilient than professional recruitment on the outset of a downturn. We are mindful that flexible staffing can decline when a downturn is prolonged, as we've experienced that in Hong Kong, which was set back by the impact of protests since early last year and now COVID-19. Given that management should be fully occupied with operational issues in its core markets during this pandemic, Does the group have the bandwidth to safeguard its non-controlling investments without stretching itself too thinly? Here's the update. 8 months on, late last month, Starflight announced changes in the board. What started off as a 6-member board when we acquired our stake has now been streamlined to a lean board of 3 new members comprising an executive chairman and 2 independent non-executive directors. These directors are very senior, well-qualified and experienced executives whom we believe will be effective in leading the company and partnering the 3 managing directors of the businesses towards short-term recovery, mid-term profitability and long-term sustainability. We will continue to work through regular dialogue and exchange of ideas on best practices and industry know-how with the board and executive team. We have observed how Staffline rose to their billion-pound mark in revenues, how they picked themselves up from the last payroll incident, how they walked through the Brexit pains last year. And now, the world is walking through COVID-19 together. Staffline is no exception. And to the question, can the Board help shareholders understand its plans for Staffline and Bambooz? Here's our response. We have long-term intentions with our investments in Staffline and Bambooz. As we get to know the respective boards and executive teams over time, we look to work together and continue to discover each other's strengths and mutual synergies and ways to enhance shareholder value. We will continue to work through regular dialogue and exchange of ideas on best practices and industry know-how with the board and executive team.
Over the course of this year, we have ramped up efforts to reach out and connect to our target audience across multiple social media platforms such as LinkedIn, WeChat, Facebook, Instagram, and even TikTok. Before we go, we'd like to share with you a quick snapshot of the content that we've been creating. It includes industry insights from our leaders, tips and tricks from our consultants, and even a couple of fun behind-the-scenes stuff here and there. If you'd like to find out more and be part of the fun, do keep a lookout for the various social media platforms that we are on at the end of the video. Once again, a big thank you to you from all of us at HRNetGroup for spending your morning with us, and we hope to be able to meet with you again live in person next year.
Hi, I'm Catherine, the Group Business Leader of HRNetOne in Singapore and Thailand.
By holding out on hiring, we might be preparing ourselves for today, but what about in future when everything clears? Are we prepared for the next wave?
This career has actually developed me into a way better person at work and even in personal life. Congratulations on securing an interview spot.
Nervous? Excited?
Let me share some of my thoughts about creating certainties in uncertain times.
Do you have your necessary documents? Print those out the night before and place them in a file.
Very important to keep our skills relevant. Okay, thank you so much everyone.
