{"id":42637,"date":"2023-10-20T15:22:40","date_gmt":"2023-10-20T15:22:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/startupsmart.test\/2023\/10\/20\/melbourne-startup-livehire-plots-a-10-million-ipo\/"},"modified":"2023-10-20T15:22:40","modified_gmt":"2023-10-20T15:22:40","slug":"melbourne-startup-livehire-plots-a-10-million-ipo","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.startupsmart.com.au\/uncategorized\/melbourne-startup-livehire-plots-a-10-million-ipo\/","title":{"rendered":"Melbourne startup LiveHire plots a $10 million IPO"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"LiveHire<\/div>\n

A Melbourne HR startup has revealed plans for a $10 million ASX-listing that would value the company at $40 million.<\/p>\n

Cloud-based HR productivity tool LiveHire has lodged a prospectus with ASIC outlining its plan to offer 50 million new shares at $0.20 each, representing 25% of the startup\u2019s post-issue share capital.<\/p>\n

The startup, which aims to deliver talent-on-demand for businesses, will list on the ASX at the start of June if everything goes to plan.<\/p>\n

A natural step forward<\/h3>\n

LiveHire co-founder Mike Haywood says the groundwork for the listing began four and a half years ago, and is a \u201cnatural step\u201d for the tech startup.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve been through four private funding rounds along with the deliberate growth of the business as we hit incremental levels,\u201d Haywood tells StartupSmart<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u201cTypically with tech companies 90% fail before the third funding round. It was important for us to pass through those rounds privately before we decided to go on market. That\u2019s the natural move now.\u201d<\/p>\n

LiveHire co-founder and managing director Antonluigi Gozzi adds that it\u2019s important for companies operating in the HR space to be transparent, and the public listing is the right way to go.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s very, very important that technology like this is agnostic of any other technology, and from an investment perspective you don\u2019t want to be aligning yourself with any particular parties out there in the space,\u201d Gozzi tells StartupSmart<\/em>.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou need to be trusted by all so it\u2019s a natural growth path to be a listed company.\u201d<\/p>\n

The IPO cash injection will be used to expand the company\u2019s operations locally and ready it for international growth.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s all about scale,\u201d Haywood says.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs LiveHire continues to use more communities the network effect continues to grow. We\u2019re in an accelerate growth phase now so it\u2019s about building out that network first in Australia and New Zealand and then offshore in Asia and the US.\u201d<\/p>\n

Funding the expansion plans<\/h3>\n

Despite Haywood saying the company earns revenue from users from day one, the company saw a net loss of more than $2 million in the six months ending December 31, according to the company\u2019s prospectus.<\/p>\n

LiveHire operates on a subscription model with users charged a 50 cent fee for each \u2018Talent community connection\u2019.<\/p>\n

But Haywood says the company has doubled in the last quarter in terms of the employees and clients and is ready to aggressively expand.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re very much finished with the creation phase and now we\u2019re in the acceleration phase,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cAny tech company that ticks the boxes and is in a rapid scaling mode has a natural alignment to being in a listed environment. There\u2019s a general sense of urgency where you need to deliver, and that\u2019s what we\u2019ve been trying to deliver and have been since the beginning of the year.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gozzi says investors have already shown strong interest in the public offering.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of interest from sophisticated investors and funds and we\u2019re very pleased with how things are going,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cPeople really value the fact that the company has been conservative and taken it all in steps.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve generated very good technology and we\u2019ve got a very sticky, very supportive client base.\u201d<\/p>\n

Like email versus Slack<\/h3>\n

LiveHire is a cloud-based productivity tool for HR sourcing and recruitment, offering a \u201ctalent community\u201d software solution.<\/p>\n

Its prospectus lists the likes of SEEK, PageUP and LinkedIn as its primary competitors, but Haywood says the startup stands out from the pack.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re in our own category,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cLiveHire is hosting talent communities which are part of a broader ecosystem where the talent is joining different communities which are part of a broader ecosystem \u2013 users can have the one profile and update it privately.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is effectively a new category that more effectively manages the flow of talent into a business.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere LiveHire is playing it doesn\u2019t currently have a peer. It\u2019s like email versus Slack.\u201d<\/p>\n

LiveHire recently recruited a series of high-flying corporates<\/a> from the likes of Telstra and Gumtree, and says these people are crucial to the company\u2019s prospects.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe success of the company currently depends to a significant extend on its management team,\u201d the prospectus reads.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe loss of key management personnel or any delay in their replacement could have a significant adverse effect on the management of the company, its financial performance and future prospects.\u201d<\/p>\n

Placing user experience at the fore<\/h3>\n

According to Gozzi, a core element of LiveHire\u2019s success has been its \u201crelentless\u201d focus on the user\u2019s experience and how the technology can best service its customers.<\/p>\n

He says the company\u2019s user experience designers regularly spend a \u2018day in the life\u2019 of LiveHire customers with the aim of understanding how the platform is used.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey spend time with our customers \u2013 there\u2019s no better way to understand how the technology gets used and what the people need,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cTechnology is something you need to work on with your customers. You need to bring customers in early on and iterate with them until the technology is efficient.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou need to know your technology inside out \u2013 it\u2019s not something you can just outsource and think will get done.\u201d<\/p>\n

Haywood says that the aim is for the technology to become an integral part of its users’ day-to-day life.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor a technology to be valuable it needs to encompass a lot of someone\u2019s work day,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey\u2019re engaging with the platform to deliver the productivity. You need to see where the leakages are and where people are going outside the system to achieve things when they should be staying inside.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou need to become a part of someone\u2019s work day.\u201d<\/p>\n

This process requires the founders to be constantly taking users\u2019 feedback on board, he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou have to be relentlessly curious about how to deliver value to the clients and not be afraid to get constant feedback, and bad feedback,\u201d Haywood says.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s about gluing yourself to the customers and sitting in their office to the point of being annoying.\u201d<\/p>\n

And most importantly, Gozzi says it\u2019s about learning from past failures.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt takes many iterations and pivots,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou learn from your mistakes and fail forward. You need to take them as learnings and understand that even if your vision remains clear your product has to continually evolve until you can see it scaling naturally.\u201d<\/p>\n

Follow StartupSmart on<\/em> Facebook,<\/em> Twitter,<\/em>LinkedIn <\/em>and <\/em>SoundCloud.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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