02/25/2014 | XING

XING 2013 results show quarterly growth acceleration

Total revenues grew 16 percent YoY to €84.8 million
42 percent growth in e-Recruiting division
CEO Vollmoeller: “Unabated growth also expected for 2014”
XING AG Executive Board proposes dividend increase and payment of a special dividend

Hamburg, February 25, 2014 – XING, the leading business network in German-speaking countries (D-A-CH), saw quarterly revenue growth acceleration during the 2013 fiscal year. Revenues for Q1 grew by 11 percent YoY, 15 percent YoY in Q2, 18 percent YoY in Q3, and 19 percent YoY in Q4. In total, XING generated revenues of €84.8 million in 2013, which is a 16 percent rise over 2012 (€73.3 million). The company’s EBITDA grew by 11 percent to €24.3 million (€22.0 million in 2012), while net profit for the period grew by 15 percent YoY to €10.5 million (€9.2 million in 2012).

16 percent total revenue growth and 42 percent e-Recruiting growth
XING AG’s largest revenue source, the Network/Premium segment, reported growth of 6 percent. The e-Recruiting division posted the largest relative growth of 42 percent, taking revenues there to €23.7 million (€16.7 million). The Events division reported revenues of €4.9 million, an increase of 26 percent compared to 2012 (€3.9 million).

Thomas Vollmoeller said the following in summary of his first full year as XING AG CEO: “We have instilled new growth impetus throughout the entire company. This enabled us to accelerate our growth levels quarter for quarter. A total of 839,000 people signed up to XING in D-A-CH during 2013, which is our highest new-member rate for four years. In terms of our product, we completely redesigned key parts of the platform by launching a new portfolio, the New Premium, and a new version of the Talent Manager (XTM). The outlook is also positive as we expect to see unabated growth in 2014 as well.”
Core parts of the platform and product completely redesigned
The 2013 financial figures are based on a new level of innovation that has shaped the company over the last twelve months. To this end, XING launched a new member profile that moves away from the conventional resume-based format to a fully customizable way for XING members to present themselves in a professional environment that´s as individual as their own resume. This move is XING’s way of keeping pace with the fundamental changes currently taking place on the labor market that is becoming increasingly diverse and personal.

In October XING relaunched its Premium membership to provide paid members with an entirely new experience boasting a range of innovative and improved features as well as perks to help them during their daily working life. Premium members now have access to statistics about profile visitors such as recruiters or clients. Premium partner offers also help to optimize paid XING members’ daily working lives with perks such as Workspaces from our partner Design Offices. This gives Premium members access to a free XING-branded workstation with Wi-Fi in a number of cities throughout Germany. Anyone wanting to save time on their grocery shopping can take advantage of the discounted home delivery offer from supermarket partner REWE. And a twelve-month subscription to the German daily newspaper DIE WELT website also helps Premium members to stay on top of the latest news.

XING has also been working hard for its B2B customers in the last twelve months. XING attended the Zukunft Personal trade fair where it gave a presentation to launch a completely new version of the Talent Manager, an active candidate sourcing tool for recruiters that comes with an advanced search, special filters, handy ways to manage candidate profiles, an intuitive and modern design, and a range of new and innovative features. This new version is one of the many reasons why HR managers who go online to find people for their vacancies use XING far more than other online platforms. This was confirmed by a representative Forsa survey conducted among 101 recruiters in August 2013 where 62 percent of those surveyed said that they use XING, while only 15 percent said they use the conventional job portal that came in in second place. The second most popular business network received just 3 percent of the votes.

In this regard, Thomas Vollmoeller said: “We have put a lot of work into extensively modernizing and increasing the appeal of our product. But this is no cause for us to rest on our laurels. We’re working on a number of projects this year to continuing our growth course. One such example is to redesign one of the oldest parts of the XING platform, the Groups section.” XING is currently developing a new Groups section for the more than 2 million XING members in one of over 66,000 groups on XING. As well as a new and user-friendly design, group members will be able to embed images and videos in their posts. In a few weeks’ time, the groups section will be available for the first time ever in the XING iPhone and Android apps.
839,000 new members in D-A-CH core market
The many improvements and innovations introduced during the last twelve months have also had a positive impact on XING’s member growth. In 2013, XING even exceeded the previous year’s record by adding around 839,000 new members in the D-A-CH core market, the highest new-member rate for four years. XING registered a total of 6.9 million members in D-A-CH as of the end of 2013, and 14 million worldwide. Thanks to exceptionally strong growth levels, in mid-January XING passed the 7-million-member mark in D-A-CH just a few weeks after the end of a successful financial year. XING AG Executive Board proposes dividend increase and payment of a special dividend
The Executive Board of Hamburg-based XING AG (ISIN DE000XNG8888) yesterday decided to put forward a proposal to the Supervisory Board to increase the basic dividend from €0.56 per share to €0.62 per share in light of the Company’s preliminary unaudited figures for the 2013 fiscal year. The Executive Board also decided to pay a special dividend of €3.58 per share. XING’s liquid assets of €66 million as of the end of 2013 and its cash-generative business model enable it to pay out a special dividend without any change to its continued growth strategy.
After confirmation of the audited consolidated financial statements, the profit appropriation proposal is to be presented to the Annual General Meeting for resolution on the appropriation of the net income. Subject to approval by the Supervisory Board and Shareholders at the Annual General Meeting to be held on 23 May 2014, the total dividend payment will amount to around €23.4 million.

About XING
XING is the social network for business professionals. More than 14 million members worldwide – over 7 million of whom are based in German-speaking countries – use XING to boost their business, job, and career. XING is a platform where professionals from all kinds of different industries can meet up, find jobs, colleagues, new assignments, cooperation partners, experts and generate business ideas. Members can meet and exchange views in over 66,000 specialist groups, while also getting together at networking events. The platform is operated by XING AG, which was founded in Hamburg, Germany, in 2003, has been publicly listed since 2006, and listed on the TecDAX since September 2011. In December 2010, XING acquired amiando AG, a Munich-based company and Europe’s leading provider of online event management and ticketing. At the end of 2013, amiando AG was renamed XING EVENTS GmbH. The acquisition of kununu GmbH, the leading platform for employer reviews in German-speaking countries, allows XING to extend its position as the social recruiting market leader. Please visit