Highlights and Trends in the HRO Market for H1 2013: Part 2

Amy L. Gurchensky, HRO Research Analyst, NelsonHall

Last week, I zeroed in on specific market activity within the payroll, learning and RPO service lines. This week, I’ll take a closer look at H1 2013 activity within benefits administration and MPHRO as well as provide some insights on what to expect in H2 2013 based on NelsonHall’s recent HRO Confidence Index.

Benefits Administration

Contract signings aside, there has been a plethora of activity within benefits administration in H1 2013, including:

• New offerings:
  • Mercer launched a private benefits exchange, Mercer Marketplace
  • Buck Consultants launched an automatic enrollment offering in the U.K.
  • Secova launched a Coordination of Benefits (COB) audit offering to coordinate benefits with insurance carriers
• Acquisitions: Wageworks acquired Crosby Benefit Systems and Benefit Concepts to strengthen its H&W administration offering, including reimbursement account and COBRA administration
• Partnerships:
  • Fidelity partnered with Extend Health, a Towers Watson company, to provide retiree healthcare services
  • JLT Employee Benefits partnered with Vielife for health and wellbeing services in the U.K.
• New technologies:
  • Xerox launched an account-based benefits portal, BenefitWallet, to assist with managing multiple health accounts on one platform, including HSAs, HRAs, FSAs, HIAs (health/wellness incentive accounts) and other specialized services
  • Aon Hewitt launched an absence management tool, 360 Absence Solutions, to help clients manage absence-related costs, compliance risks, the administrative burden and lost productivity
• Educational resources:
  • Mercer and ADP both launched websites to provide information on healthcare reform
  • Ceridian launched an auto-enrollment knowledge center in the U.K.

MPHRO

In recent years, the MPHRO market has been relatively quiet in terms of contract announcements and H1 2013 was no exception. However, my last MPHRO research study, published in February 2013, revealed that the market is very much alive with new wins and contract renewals from all the major vendors, including IBM and Accenture. In fact, IBM recently won a new seven-year, multi-country MPHRO contract, which was bundled with F&A outsourcing services. Other wins include ADP and Marriott Vacations Worldwide for core HR, payroll, time & labor management and talent management covering ~9.2k employees.

Many vendors have been focused on their strategies for expansion, including Aon Hewitt with its acquisition of OmniPoint Workday Services. Although still early, NelsonHall expects ADP to make inroads in LATAM with its MPHRO services since it added RPO capabilities in this region from its acquisition of The RightThing and now expands its payroll footprint from the Payroll S.A. acquisition.

H2 2013

So what does the rest of the year have in store? NelsonHall’s recent HRO Confidence Index survey finds that overall expectations for HRO revenue growth remain at the same level as those reported for the last five quarters; with payroll leading followed by RPO. Top industry sectors for HRO services include healthcare, pharmaceuticals and high-tech. By geography, vendors have reported increased confidence for revenue growth in Central and Eastern Europe and Central and Latin America.

Needless to say, it will be interesting to see how the rest of the year unfolds for HRO.

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Catching Up with ADP

Linda Merritt, HRO Research Analyst, NelsonHall

The recent passing of long-term U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg reminds us of his early role in the formation of what became ADP, a founding member of HR outsourcing. In the early 1950s he was engaged in selling insurance and sold a policy to two young New Jersey businessmen, Henry and Joseph Taub. The Taub’s were pioneering a then new concept; payroll outsourcing. The brothers knew payroll processing and Lautenberg knew sales and marketing. Lautenberg took a risk and joined the Taub brothers and together they created a new industry.

Establish Operating Principles

By the time the company incorporated in 1961 the three leaders established principles that still guide the company some 60 years later. Following are a few of the principles they put in place.

Focus on Business Markets that Offer Significant Growth Opportunities

ADP has always pursued growth through new market opportunities, both by expanding it service lines and by entering new geographies. Much of the early growth was through acquisitions, as well as organic growth. Lautenberg retired as CEO from ADP in 1982 having made over 100 acquisitions!

Over time, ADP became a global player. An early acquisition was GSI, a large payroll and HR services company in Europe. The latest 2013 acquisition is Payroll S.A. to expand LATAM payroll capabilities to Chile, Argentina, and Peru. In the last few years major acquisitions included Workscape (benefits), The RightThing (RPO) and SHPS (benefits).

Embrace Technological Change to Enhance Product and Service Offerings

By the early 1960s ADP had moved from manual operations to the pre-computer punch cards and on to leasing its first computer: an IBM 1401 mainframe. That willingness to continue to embrace the new is seen in ADP’s successful launch of a series of cloud-based SaaS HR technology and BPO service platforms, including Workforce Now (1k-20K employees), Vantage HCM (50-3k employees), and GlobalView for multi-nationals. Together, the three services support more than 40k clients.

The company has also launched extensive mobility options, including RUN powered by ADP for small business mobile payroll and ADP Mobile Solutions for access to a broad range of information and transactions spanning time and attendance to benefits and pay cards.

Attract and Retain Motivated and Talented People

ADP has grown into a $10bn global outsourcing business with one of only four remaining AAA credit ratings in the U.S. With ~570k clients across 125 countries, we know customers support its line-up of services and proprietary developed technologies. What about people? A few recent awards tell the story:

• Ranked second on Fortune’s 2012 list of America’s Most Admired Companies in Financial Data Service
• Ranked in the Top 50 on IDG’s Computerworld 2012 list of the 100 Best Places to Work in Information Technology (IT)
• Named to the 2012 Working Mother 100 Best Companies, for the third time.

We therefore need to ask the question of prospective purchasers: does your prospective or current HRO service provider have long-term guiding principles and can you see evidence of them in action? Because ADP does.

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Have You Tripled Your HRO Business?

Linda Merritt, HRO Research Analyst, NelsonHall

TriNet has tripled its PEO and HR services business in five years with major acquisitions and organic growth under CEO Burton Goldfield.Most PEO’s are small businesses serving the local small business market. TriNet started out that way as well in 1988 in San Leandro, CA. Over time, it acquired other PEO’s and began expanding services to new localities. The first big acquisition was Gevity in 2009, helping the regional company to become a national player.

Acquiring Growth

In 2012, TriNet went on a buying spree with three acquisitions fueled by low interest rates, easy access to capital, and its own cash:

• Accord HR, a small PEO for additional geographic coverage
• ExpenseCloud, which added expense reporting as a service line
• Strategic Sourcing, Inc. (SOI), a larger PEO for additional scale and expertise.

ExpenseCloud and SOI will each maintain their name, brand, products, and services and operate as TriNet business units.

With the addition of SOI, the company almost doubled in size from 750 employees to 1,400, and it has gone from one office as a start-up to thirty-five in many areas of the country.

Growing Organically

Before and during growth by acquisition, the company was growing organically. It has been recognized by Inc. and included in the Inc. Hall of Fame for five years of rapid growth.  With the combination of both strategies, the company is now the largest privately held PEO in the U.S. and revenues have nearly tripled in the last five years.

Cloud-based, On Demand, and Mobile

Just this week, TriNet released it latest HRP Mobile app for Android and iOS:

• My Paycheck: access to payroll data and compare payroll statements
• My Time: information about planned time-off, accruals and balances, and submit and manage time-off requests
• My Benefits: view of key health benefits details
• About Me: update employee information
• Company Directory: find and call work contacts; also includes an organization chart search option
• Contact TriNet: contact employee solution center via email or phone.

PEOs like TriNet and its customers are benefiting from the evolution of affordable SaaS and cloud-based platform services and advances in mobile any-device access. Now even small local start-ups and mid-sized regional businesses have access to full HR suites and services.

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The Parable of IBM and Kenexa: Part II

Linda Merritt, HRO Research Analyst, NelsonHall

It’s common for major HRO announcements to be followed by a conference call, and sometimes one-on-one briefings are also offered for analysts as in the case of the IBM and Kenexa deal.  Naturally, the NelsonHall HRO team including myself, Gary Bragar, and Amy Gurchensky took advantage of both opportunities.  

IBM’s Own View

The initial announcement was largely from the perspective of the IBM Social Business group that will add Kenexa’s HCM capabilities to its combination of social media, content management, and analytics. IBM believes that this creates value through the application of social technology to front office processes and generates ROI by creating social networks of expertise that leverage analytic insights to improve business processes. In sum, a “Smarter Workforce.”

It is the Whole Elephant…

In Part I, I compared the various views of the IBM and Kenexa news to the analogy of the blind men and the elephant. The answer is that all of the following interpretations are rationales of the deal:

• Builds upon IBM’s social media, analytics, and professional services including BPO
• Brings valuable software, HRO expertise, as well as talent management capabilities
• Increases competition and cross-selling to both IBM’s and Kenexa’s base of Fortune 500 customers
• Delivers value to C-suite executives, HR executives, and the whole value chain of management and employees.

…and Much More

The IBM Global Process Service’s HRO team was involved from the start and will be deeply involved throughout the integration process. RPO services will be combined creating an even bigger global footprint with new service centers including three in the U.S. Kenexa’s learning platform will be reverse engineered to support IBM’s learning services. There are also other parts of Kenexa that can be kept or spun off such as compensation services, behavioral sciences surveys and assessments, and middle market customers.

Kenexa will be a wholly-owned subsidiary for the first year to allow time to determine the best options for unleashing the full value of the deal. Kenexa brings innovative and collaborative intellectual capabilities and a portion of the value is greater than the “stuff” that can be divided up. Even with Kenexa’s leadership intact, the decisions will be many, with lots of players due to the matrix nature of the services and opportunities adding to the normal M&A complexities.

IBM’s Smart Workforce incorporates the concept of the boundary-less enterprise that works across the “whitespace” between processes and organizational silos. IBM wants to make human capital management an integral part of business operations by enabling people to unleash their talent when, where, and how it is most needed to create measureable value.

We each see the world through our own lens of experience and expectations, and sometimes the truly new and innovative “elephant” is harder to see. IBM and Kenexa can create the truly new and we should all hope they do. HCM, HR, HRO, HR tech, IT, social media, and more will have to raise their game to benefit from the new technology, services, and consulting opportunities. And that is a good thing!

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IBM Accentuates its RPO and Talent Management Offering by Acquiring Kenexa

Gary Bragar, HRO Research Director, NelsonHall

Although a bit smaller than the $1.9bn Oracle paid for Taleo (coincidentally at $46 per share as well) and the $3.4bn SAP paid for SuccessFactors, I believe that IBM’s acquisition of Kenexa, a cash transaction at $46 per share or ~$1.3bn and closing in Q4 2012, will have a much more immediate and larger impact than the aforementioned acquisitions.

Both Taleo and SuccessFactors were specifically acquired for their talent management (TM) technology. Beyond the strength of Kenexa’s technology, however, is the provision of TM services including:

• Consulting
• RPO
• Employee engagement
• Leadership development.

According to an IBM study conducted earlier this year, 71% of respondents cited “human capital” as the leading source of sustained economic value, above products and services innovation and significantly higher than technology. Kenexa, as a HCM and TM provider, will compliment IBM’s TM offering, which focuses on the full TM life cycle of attracting, developing, rewarding, and retaining talent. Specifically, IBM’s TM offering includes:

• Recruiting
• Learning
• Performance management
• Compensation
• Succession management.

In addition to its multi-process HRO (MPHRO) offering, which includes TM, IBM also specializes in providing workforce strategy transformation, social technology, and analytics to predict and measure performance.

While RPO is part of IBM’s MPHRO offering, it also provides RPO on a standalone basis to GM. Kenexa’s RPO capabilities, however, will accelerate IBM’s RPO market share, making it one of the largest RPO providers globally with clients headquartered in North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific. Kenexa also delivers RPO services in Latin America including South America in ~25% of its contracts.

Kenexa’s BrassRing technology is one of the two most widely used applicant tracking systems in RPO contracts. Kenexa also brings its Kenexa 2x Recruit platform, which in addition to recruiting and learning contains the following performance management modules:

• Goal setting
• Competencies
• Performance appraisals
• Compensation
• Career development and pathing
• Succession planning.

NelsonHall estimates that Kenexa has more than tripled the size of its RPO business since 2006 with brand name clients including Ford and multi-regional contracts with Baker Hughes and Eli Lilly.

IBM’s price of $46 per share is a 42% premium over Kenexa’s August 24^th close, but it will be well worth it. IBM is getting much more than software technology; it is getting assets, including human talent that can make a HCM difference. IBM’s plan is to combine its approach to social business, analytics, and TM to transform business processes to create smarter workforces with measureable business results. Given Kenexa’s record of growth and IBM’s experience with integrating acquisitions, this sounds like a good plan and a great business opportunity for both companies.

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Benefits Administration Poised for a Good Year: Part 2

Earlier this week, I highlighted revenue growth reported by benefits administration service providers. In addition to the positive earnings reported, there are other signs indicating that 2012 will be good to benefits administration including acquisitions, hiring, and surveys.

There have been a few strategic acquisitions that will boost benefits administration revenues for vendors this year. For example, ADP’s benefits administration business will see a nice increase from SHPS, which had annualized revenues of ~$80m. Morneau Shepell’s acquisition of SBC Systems Company will modestly increase its revenues, and more importantly will strengthen the company’s presence in the U.S. Finally and most recently announced is Towers Watson’s acquisition of Extend Health, which will enhance its benefits administration offering by adding exchange services for retirees.

Another positive sign of expected future growth is the hiring of personnel. Towers Watson announced that it will be hiring employees within all of its segments. The benefits segment, specifically, will get an additional 172 employees, 60 of which will be for technology & administration solutions (TAS).

Finally, regardless of the constitutionality of the PPACA, benefits administration will likely flourish as compliance becomes increasingly complex as new regulations are issued or as older ones are amended for other federal laws such as COBRA, HIPAA, FMLA, etc.

A recent study by ADP cites that health care reform and compliance complexity are expected to lead to more benefits administration outsourcing. The survey, which included input from 504 HR and benefits decision makers in the U.S., found that ensuring compliance is one of the top reasons cited for outsourcing benefits administration.

In a recent article, Mercer is also advising employers to act to ensure compliance and to implement cost-control strategies now regardless of health care reform. It recommends the following, which are all dollar signs for benefits administration service providers:

• Managing the cost of dependent coverage, which will strengthen demand for dependent eligibility audits and verifications
• Shifting to CDHPs, which will lead to an increase for reimbursement account administration services including FSAs, HSAs, and HRAs
• Offering cost-competitive health coverage, which will boost demand for private health care exchanges for both active and retired employees
• Encouraging a healthier workforce, which will lead to the implementation of wellness programs (i.e., health assessments, biometric screenings, etc.).

Benefits administration is one of the oldest foundations of HR business process outsourcing and it is also one of the largest segments in revenues and yet it remains vital, adaptive, competitive, and ready for continued growth!

Amy L. Gurchensky, Research Analyst, HRO, NelsonHall

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Oracle Buying Taleo: Is It a Good Deal?

As Howie Mandel always says to his guests after they’ve pressed the button and say “Deal!” on the TV show Deal or No Deal—”but was it a good deal?” Time will of course tell, but I do believe Oracle has made a very good deal. As the acquisition was announced just last February 9, I’ll briefly recap what had happened.

Oracle announced an agreement to buy Taleo for $46 per share, an 18% premium over Taleo’s stock price the day before the announcement, equating to $1.9 billion. As Taleo’s board has approved the acquisition, it is now subject to normal regulatory approval and is expected to close by summer. This follows SAP’s announcement on December 3, 2011 to acquire SuccessFactors for $3.4 billion. I had blogged about my take on the acquisition last December 13, 2011, stating that SuccessFactors is a provider of talent management software, but software alone does not get at the core of what makes for effective talent management. First, let me state that I also feel that SAP buying SuccessFactors was a good deal, albeit a steep price, as cloud-based software, including talent management is clearly on the rise and expected to continue to grow. NelsonHall has seen a large increase in the number of cloud SaaS HR services contracts and nearly 15% of HRO contracts in 2011 also included talent management software, often performance management, mostly in the mid-market.

Getting back to Oracle, Taleo provides cloud-based talent management software as well, so this is also a good deal, but how does that make this different? Because Taleo adds recruitment capability that Oracle did not have before. And although SuccessFactors provides recruitment software as does Taleo, Taleo also has an applicant tracking system that according to NelsonHall’s 2011 RPO report is the most widely used recruitment technology and applicant tracking system, utilized by approximately 80% of all RPO vendors for their clients, Oracle’s PeopleSoft had been in sixth place. The RPO report also noted that approximately 45% of all recruitment technology was platform-based. Taleo also has a business edition, popular in the mid-market for clients seeking a more standardized solution, used by vendors including Alexander Mann Solutions and Pinstripe. According to NelsonHall’s HRO forecast, RPO will have the highest growth of all HR services through the forecast period of 2015.

In summary, I think both acquisitions by SAP and Oracle are good; especially as clients continue to focus on talent management and recognize the need to have integrated technology and processes, most importantly supported by leadership that understand this. I’m in the final stages of my learning BPO research interviews and I‘m seeing a clear trend that learning vendors are now also providing talent management software and associated consulting services to their clients along with their learning services. I look forward to aggregating this data that I’ll present at the HRO Today Forum in Washington, DC on May 1st, titled State of the Learning BPO Marketplace, including the Emergence of Social Learning.

Gary Bragar, HRO Research Director, NelsonHall

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Three Forces Shaping HRO for 2012

As 2011 comes to a close, let’s look ahead to 2012 and the three current trends that will continue into the New Year and beyond.

HR SaaS has been around for years. Now that the breadth of cloud coverage is in the HR ERP space it is opening up the middle market for HRO at long last, and is swimming upstream into the large client market. HR mobile applications are proliferating and vendors will be hard-pressed to deal with the rising demand by clients and participants for more on-the-go functionality. What seemed like an innovative differentiator is quickly becoming a competitive requirement.

HRO globalization has long been on the agenda of many HRO vendors, mainly targeted by major multinational companies (MNCs), but there are only so many global MNCs. We are now seeing additional focus on regional service networks for multi-country companies. HRO activity in emerging markets is also picking up for MNCs and for in-country client services. Expect to see HRO acquisitions, partnerships, and new offices for sales and service delivery grow in 2012 as service providers continue to fill-in geographic footprints and service gaps.

The globalization of RPO will continue to be a big story in 2012. RPO vendors are gearing up to meet the demand and two of the largest acquisitions in 2011 included SourceRight (part of SFN Group), which was acquired by Randstad, and The RightThing, which was acquired by ADP.

The growing global RPO demand was illustrated in a big way by Kenexa when it was awarded with a five-year RPO contract by Eli Lilly and Company, which includes recruiting in Asia Pacific, Europe, and the Americas. NelsonHall estimates the deal to be worth more than $50 million, one of the largest RPO contracts to date.

HRO contract awards will continue to increase across Asia Pacific, with some year to year variability due to economic conditions. Three years ago, ~10% of contracts included Australia, with half of those for clients headquartered in Australia. Two years ago, it was ~11%, with about an even split of Australian-based clients. In the past year, the number has jumped to ~16%, with the majority of contracts for clients based in Australia.

China has also emerged as a client base for HRO, including for in-country services. As emerging market companies reach a fast-growth stage and expand their services internationally, the need for HR technology, processes, and delivery capabilities can outstrip the local talent base for HR. For example, Manpower made two acquisitions in China, REACH HR in South China and Xi’ and Fresco in Henan Province.

These are three of the forces shaping the future of HRO. Those HRO vendors that are able to update their portfolio of services and quickly and cost effectively invest in the acquisition or development of new capabilities will gain an advantage in the growing marketplace for HRO.

Interested in reading the latest HRO news from NelsonHall? Subscribe to our newsletter by emailing amy.gurchensky@nelson-hall.com with “HRO Insight” as the subject.

Randstad Acquisition Frenzy… This Time in North America Acquiring SFN Group

A pretty big acquisition happened last week in the staffing and recruiting industry. Here is the backdrop.

On July 20, 2011, Randstad announced that it is going to acquire SFN Group to expand in North America. Randstad is headquartered in the Netherlands and SFN Group in the United States. It is a cash tender offer at $14 per share. Approved by both boards, the acquisition, now subject to regulatory approvals and a tender offer of at least 50% of SFN Group’s outstanding shares, equates to ~$771m. This is a premium of 53% over SFN Group’s closing share on July 19, 2011. The acquisition is expected to close in September 2011.

The Randstad Group will have combined revenues of ~$22bn / €17bn (pro forma as of March 31, 2011). In North America, the combined company will have $4.6bn in revenues (pro forma as of March 31, 2011) from the following service segments:

• 52% Staffing
• 39% Professionals
•   9% HR Services including payroll, managed services, and RPO.

Randstad, who already has sizeable revenue in North America, now becomes a major force. Randstad, which had full year 2010 revenues of €14,179m, obtained 13% of its revenues (or €1,848m) from North America, which equates to over $2.6Bn. The SFN Group had full full year revenues of $2,053m. Approximately 80% of Randstad’s 2010 revenues were in Europe.

So, is Randstad trying to conquer the staffing world via acquisitions? Its last acquisition was in August 2010, acquiring FujiStaff Holdings to strengthen its presence in the Japanese staffing market. Since 2006, Randstad has merged and partnered with five other companies in Japan to provide staffing services that include temporary and permanent hires, contract staffing, and internal recruiting for industries that include healthcare, real estate, and construction. Since 2005, Randstad has been acquisitive elsewhere  in growing its staffing business including in:

• U.K.
• Germany (3)
• Netherlands
• China
• Switzerland.

Randstad now also picks up SourceRight Solutions’ RPO business, which NelsonHall estimated as the third largest RPO provider in North America in its 2011 RPO market analysis report. SourceRight’s RPO business has had significant year-over year revenue growth in H1 2011. Its RPO business has primarily been in North America, but expect for it to expand into Europe by 2012. More to follow in a future blog…

Gary Bragar,  HR Outsourcing Research Director, NelsonHall