In early March, Monster revealed that it would be retaining Stone Key Partners and Bank of America Merrill Lynch to review its financial situation. This “review of strategic alternatives” included the possibility of selling Monster Worldwide. Silver Lake Partners, a private technology investment company, was also named as a party interested in the possible sale.

From the Reuters report:

The company, which has roughly $950 million market capitalization, plans to send out financial information to the interested parties by the end of next week, they said.

Representatives for Monster and LinkedIn declined to comment. Silver Lake, Stone Key Partners and Bank of America had no immediate comment.

So, an anonymous source and no comment from the companies. Not much to go on, but the story has a ring of truth to it. LinkedIn is good at connecting employers and potential employees through social media, but integrating an established job search engine would be an interesting next step for the company. LinkedIn has been on a roll lately, posting impressive quarterly figures and increasing its mobile presence by releasing a well-regarded iPad app.

What do you think? How would a social network such as LinkedIn use a job search engine? Leave a comment below and let us know your ideas.

(via Reuters)

When asked about the possible purchase, a Monster spokesperson said, “it is the company’s policy not to comment on rumors.”

This is not the first time in the last few years that rumors have circulated regarding Coca-Cola’s acquisition of Monster, due to the fact that Coca-Cola distributes the energy drink.

The purchase of Monster by Coca-Cola would prove to be difficult because of the price tag attached. At $11 billion, any company in America would be hard pressed to come up with that kind of cash.

Update:

After trading for the day had ended, Coca-Cola was asked about a possible take over of Monster and this is what they had to say: “We are not in discussions to acquire the Monster Beverage Corporation.” They will consider a partnership but are not trying to acquire them.

Monster will become Yahoo’s provider of career and job content in Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Mexico and Peru. Monster says the partnership will give it access to almost 55 million new Internet users in Latin America. Terms of the deal were not released.

“The alliance with Yahoo! offers great synergy for our clients in Latin America, many of whom approach their needs in the market from a regional point of view,” said Rob Brouwer, senior vice president for Latin America and Developing Markets, for Monster Worldwide.

“For millions of job-seekers, this is extremely welcome news. As more and more seekers are casting a wider net that includes cross-border opportunities, giving them the ability to tap into Monster’s global footprint provides them with a tremendous advantage.”

Recently Yahoo tapped Zillow to power all of its real estate listings and sell local ads on both sites.

The agreement will see Monster provide career- and job-related content on Yahoo’s homepages in the U.S. and Canada for three years.  Monster’s also getting the opportunity to negotiate similar agreements with other Yahoo properties worldwide.

Then, according to a press release, there may be "performance based annual payments calculated by clicks and expressions of interest, subject to annual floors and ceilings."  (No further details were given on this front.)

Anyway, Hilary Schneider, Yahoo’s Executive Vice President, explained the sale by stating, "The transaction with Monster enables us to continue to provide an important service to our users through the traffic agreement.  Yahoo! remains focused on its core businesses and delivering exceptional experiences to users, partners and advertisers."

Yahoo and Monster expect to complete the acquisition (and subsequently start the three-year traffic agreement) during the third quarter of this year.

Related Articles:

> Microsoft-Yahoo Deal Gets Approval Deadline In Europe

> Yahoo Possibly Interested In Yelp

> VMware’s Acquisition Of Zimbra Made Official

The technology was developed through Monster’s acquisition of Trovix back in 2008. Monster says it utilizes intuitive, concept-based searching, with a "human-like understanding" of the recruiting process and hiring needs. It understands job titles, skills, experience level, industries, education, and the hierarchy of concepts. According to Monster, this helps it evaluate a candidate’s work experience like a recruiter would in just a fraction of the time.

"While traditional keyword search engines are limited in their ability to distinguish concepts and meanings of words and cannot address things like recent vs. dated experience, the intelligence of the 6Sense technology contextually interprets the meaning behind words and concepts rather than relying on the narrow, literal meaning of keywords," Monster says.

"The 6Sense semantic search technology is an extension of our investment in many technology innovations we’ve delivered over the past two years," said Darko Dejanovic, executive vice president, Global CIO and head of product for Monster. "We’ve continued to invest significantly in technology, product and infrastructure to completely revamp the talent and job search experience. This investment has consistently delivered significant improvements and value to our customers, saving them time and money by simplifying the process of identifying and evaluating qualified candidates, thus allowing more informed hiring decisions."

Monster’s new search technology comes at a time when a massive amount of people in the U.S. are desperate to find jobs. Monster.com gets over 40 million unique monthly visitors in the U.S. according to data from Compete.

"Hiring is fundamental to the economic recovery. Technology can play a significant role in helping businesses mitigate the burdensome costs and resources associated with bringing on the people they need," said Monster Chairman, President and CEO Sal Iannuzzi. "I hear from our customers that their businesses have jobs that they desperately need to fill and yet don’t have the resources to make that a reality. 6Sense technology changes all of this, facilitating the hiring process so that better matches are made more efficiently thereby getting people back to work more quickly."

The technology is there for employers and job seekers alike. Monster claims it provides more relevant results because seekers don’t have to type exact terms in the job title to match.

Monster says that in addition to its advances in search, it is also continuing to invest in advanced technologies such as semantic clustering algorithms and machine learning in "domain appropriate" ways.
 

Related Articles:

> Monster Establishing 19 New Recruitment Sites

> Director Steps Off Monster’s Board

> Monster Buys Affinity Labs For $61 Million Cash

"Although the Monster Employment Index experienced a mild decline in May, there are emerging signs of stability in the hiring market. The Index has remained within a four-point band since January and the annual pace of decline seems to have leveled off,” said Jesse Harriott, senior vice president and chief knowledge officer at Monster Worldwide. "While demand has eased across most sectors of the economy, industries such as education, retail and public administration are providing some bright spots."

In May, online job availability rose in three of the Index’s 20 industry sectors and four of the 23 occupational categories monitored. Index results for the past 13 months are as follows:

Some other highlights from the index include:

- Year-over-year growth rate held relatively steady, suggesting stabilization in employer demand for workers

- Online offerings fell across all major regions of the country and 19 of the 28 major metro markets in May

 Data from the European version of the Index will be released next Tuesday.

Visits to career development websites grew 20% YoY, according to Nielsen, rising 41.5 million visitors in January 2008 to just under 50 million in January this year.

The vast majority of visitors to career development sites, around 17.8 million, are aged 35-49. However, Nielsen found a significant surge in visitors aged 65 and older, increasing 41% from 2.5 million unique visitors in January 2008 to 3.6 million in January 2009.  

It appears the need to generate income is motivating the older generation to stay in work, especially during difficult and uncertain financial times when their nest-eggs are less than secure, and they are turning to the Internet to seek out jobs. For many older job seekers who have lost long-term jobs, the Internet is a new medium through which to find new positions and opportunities exist for niche content to attract them.

This trend looks set to continue, according to a report out last year from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. They state that while the total labor force is projected to increase by 8.5% between 2006 and 2015, when broken down by age group some very different trends emerge. In particular, workers aged 55-64 are expected to rise by 36.5%, but the most dramatic surge will be among workers aged 65+ – up an incredible 80% as Baby Boomers flood the job market. 

Overall, workers aged 65 and over are predicted to make up 6.1% of the total labor force by 2016, up from 3.6% in 2006.

In January CareerBuilder was the most trafficked job site with 20.8 million unique visitors. Yahoo! HotJobs came in second with 11.8 million visitors, while Monster.com was third with 9.5 million visitors.

Big areas of growth in online job demand were the utilities industry (which registered the largest monthly increase), education, training, and library occupations, and healthcare. The biggest gains on a yearly scale, however, come with the public administration and agricultural industries. Farming, fishing and forestry had the sharpest decline for the month, while information, professional, scientific, and technical services saw the sharpest year-to-year decline.

"On the upside, the Index’s overall annual growth rate remained steady, suggesting no major change in underlying nationwide demand for labor compared to July," stated Jesse Harriott, Vice President of Research at Monster Worldwide.

The Index over the past year

While online job demand in all nine U.S. Census Bureau regions was down for the year, seven out of those nine saw growth over the month. The biggest growth came from the West North Central region. This is attributed to the aftermath of flooding. Online job demand increased in 40 states and the District of Columbia. At the city level, the Index monitors 28 U.S. metro areas. Eight of those saw an increase in online recruitment activity. Boston showed the biggest increase, and San Diego saw a nice one as well.

The Index has a ways to go before it reaches where it was a year ago, but this might be the beginning of an upward trend.

With most of them corresponding to a small newspaper, no single site can be expected to connect record numbers of people with their ideal place of employment.  On the whole, though, the scope of the development is rather impressive.

 

What with the most recent economic news – housing prices and consumer confidence aren’t in admirable shape – its timing is nice, too.

"These alliances provide thousands of consumers with another point of access to Monster’s job search and match technology, and regional employers in these markets will be able to more easily utilize Monster’s leading resume database, national reach and range of recruitment services," stated Lauren Chacon, Monster’s vice president and general manager of media alliances.

The partner papers, in case you’re wondering, are The Columbus Dispatch, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, New Hampshire Union Leader, Rutland Herald/Times Argus, Portland Press Herald/Maine Sunday Telegram, The Post and Courier, The Blade, San Francisco Examiner, Baltimore Examiner, El Nuevo Da, The Republic, Daily Reporter, The Daily Journal, and The Santa Fe New Mexican.

 Philip R. Lochner, Jr. Leaves Monster’s Board Of Directors

Monster filed a report with the SEC today, but Lochner resigned on April 1, and that low (of $23.05) actually occurred on March 20, so it looks as if a little cause and effect may be at work.  December of 2006 – a much happier time, financially speaking – is when Lochner assumed his seat on Monster’s board.

Neither Lochner nor Monster is broadcasting much in the way of details, of course; the SEC document only states, “Mr. Lochner’s resignation from the Company’s Board of Directors did not involve any disagreement on any matter relating to the Company’s operations, policies or practices.”

Now, although Monster’s stock closed at $26.14 on Friday, it’s dropped back down to $25.12; investors don’t seem to approve of Lochner’s exit.

Dan Frommer also seems to suspect something’s up; he paraphrased Monster’s statement into the insubstantial assurance “it’s totally cool.”