51job.com (NASDAQ: JOBS), one of China's main online job recruitment sites, saw total revenues increase 71.4% year-over-year, for the quarter ending September 30, 2004. The company also had print advertising revenues for the third quarter of 2004 grow 59.3% to CNY77.4 million from CNY48.6 million for the same quarter in 2003.
Rick Yan, Chief Executive Officer of 51job, Inc., said, "We are tremendously pleased with our performance. We saw growing demand for our services across all business lines. Through a targeted sales and marketing strategy, we focused on further building our '51job' brand as the 'one-stop' human resource services provider and market leader in China during the quarter."
Gross profit for the third quarter of 2004 was CNY69.8 million (US$8.4 million), representing an increase of 107.7% from CNY33.6 million for the same quarter last year. Gross margin, which is equal to gross profit divided by net revenues, grew to 54.5% in the third quarter of 2004 compared with 44.6% in the year-ago quarter. The significant expansion in gross margin was principally the result of increasing economies of scale in the recruitment advertising businesses.
Operating expenses for the third quarter of 2004 were CNY35.2 million (US$4.3 million) compared with CNY21.1 million for the same period last year due primarily to higher sales and marketing and general and administrative expenses. However, operating expenses as a percentage of net revenues decreased to 27.5% for the third quarter of 2004 from 28.0% in the September 2003 quarter as a result of improved operating efficiencies, which was partially offset by the Company's planned increase in sales and marketing expenditures.
Sales and marketing expenses for the third quarter of 2004 grew to CNY17.7 million (US$2.1 million) from CNY9.2 million for the same quarter in 2003 mainly due to the significant expansion of the salesforce and increased spending on advertising and promotional activities.
