Just days after posting miserable financial results, Chinese online recruitment and classified ads company 51job Inc. has now named two new members of its executive team.
Peter Lui has joined the company as its chief financial officer. Prior to joining 51job, he was the Asia Pacific area controller for Google. Prior to Google, Lui held finance director positions at Saatchi & Saatchi China, Oracle China and Compaq Computer China.
Kathleen Chien, formerly the company's senior vice president and chief financial officer, has been promoted to the newly created position of chief operating officer. Chien is a co-founder of the company and has been responsible for managing various functions and operations over the past 10 years at 51job.
Last week, 51job reported that its total revenues decreased 8.1% over the fourth quarter of 2007 to CNY196.2 million, and gross margin of 51.0% compared with 55.8% in fourth quarter of 2007. Gross profit for the fourth quarter of 2008 was CNY94.5 million compared with CNY112.8 million for the same quarter of the prior year. Net income for the fourth quarter of 2008 decreased to CNY6.8 million from CNY13.7 million for the same quarter in 2007.
Print advertising revenues for the fourth quarter of 2008 decreased 37.4% to CNY59.7 million from CNY95.4 million for the same quarter in 2007. The decrease was primarily due to lower average revenue per page resulting from higher revenue contribution from lower priced cities and less page volume in 51job Weekly, which was impacted by a slowdown in market demand and reduced hiring activity during the fourth quarter of 2008.