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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