By: Karim Mostafa Newspaper Company Partners Sell Their Shares Of CareerPath
Knight Ridder and Tribune Co. jointly announced Monday that they have
acquired CareerBuilder Inc. and CareerPath.com. The announcement marks
the end of a five-year joint effort by eight newspaper industry giants
to build an employment Web site.
Based in Reston, Va., CareerBuilder has accepted a bid for $8 a share
from the two newspaper companies, for a total of $200 million. The
deal is expected to go through in the third or fourth quarter of 2000.
Once the CareerBuilder acquisition is completed, the two newspaper
companies will integrate CareerPath.com into the CareerBuilder
network. Tribune and Knight Ridder have bought out the remaining five
shareholders in CareerPath.com: The New York Times Co., Gannett Co.
Inc., Cox Interactive Media, The Washington Post Co., and Hearst Corp.
Times Mirror Co. also invested in CareerPath when it was created in
1995, but its interests were acquired by Tribune Co. earlier this year.
So why CareerBuilder? According to David Hiller, president of Tribune
Interactive, CareerBuilder 'cracked the code on how to take network
traffic and monetize it.'
CareerBuilder offers a syndicated career network that allows employers
to place job listings and select where they want the ad to run. Members
using the CareerBuilder network include MSN.com, Bloomberg.com, NBC,
USAToday.com, and Ticketmaster Online-CitySearch.
McGovern, CEO and chairman of CareerBuilder, stressed that the new
additions Tribune and Knight Ridder's 44 newspapers will give the
network a local market previously untapped.
Rob McGovern will remain at the head of CareerBuilder operations.
Hiller said McGovern's sales team was one of the main reasons behind
acquiring CareerBuilder and locating operations in Reston.
Stephen Ste. Marie, CEO of Los Angeles-based CareerPath.com, said
[CareerBuilder] has 'terrific technology that is highly scalable.' He
said that CareerPath couldn't offer the same level of technology, and
he sees reasons behind integrating CareerPath with CareerBuilder.
According to Ste. Marie, CareerPath.com did manage to build a strong
brand name one of the top three job classifieds sites, with 1.5
million r?sum?s online and over 3 million registered users.
Ste. Marie said he will not stay with CareerPath beyond the next three
months. He plans to return to his previous field, cable and satellite
television.
Hiller said they haven't yet decided which brand will be used for the
merged companies.
All newspapers previously affiliated with CareerPath have been given
the opportunity to join the new network, but it's clear that some
will not. Dan Finnigan, president of KnightRidder.com, said the
affiliates have a year to decide whether or not to join.
The New York Times Co. does not intend to join the CareerBuilder
network. 'We believe our own online recruitment services are best
served through our own Web sites,' said spokesperson Katherine Mathis.
Mathis said The New York Times on the Web already has a large enough
national audience online to attract people to its job classifieds.
Mathis could not give a definite time frame for when The New York
Times Co.'s newspapers' classifieds would be removed from CareerPath.
At The Washington Post Co., spokesperson Guy Knight said, 'Our strategy
has been and will continue to be a local focus.' Coincidentally,
Washingtonpost.com yesterday announced a major upgrade to its
washingtonjobs.com section.
Ste. Marie, who worked closely with the newspaper companies over the
past few years, said that Tribune Interactive and KnightRidder.com
'have done a world-class job on the local level.' He wasn't surprised
that they led the way in this latest shift in the classified industry.
'They really understand how it works,' he said.
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Karim Mostafa (kmostafa@editorandpublisher.com) is associate editor
for E&P Online.
(c) Copyright 2000, Editor & Publisher
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