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TWST: Could you begin with a brief overview and historical sketch of StepStone (Oslo:STP.OL)?

Mr. Tenwick: StepStone provides a range of online services to the European recruitment market. These range from basic job listings or adverts, through to complicated and comprehensive searching of the near 1,000,000 current CVs that the company holds. This enables StepStone to provide recruiters with a very cost effective, fast means of sourcing talent; we are Europe’s largest independent online recruitment company. In addition we provide hosting services, where we manage the online job sections and recruitment websites for over 60 companies, and recently via StepStone’s Enterprise Recruitment Solutions have expanded the services we offer to provide a completely hosted and tailored suite of solutions for managing companies Talent Management information requirements. From this you can see that we offer quite a broad range of online recruitment services. The company was formed in Norway in 1996 and was one of the very first European online recruitment companies and certainly one of the only ones to come out of the Nordics. The company floated in the Spring of 2000 and is today quoted on the Oslo Stock Exchange in Norway with over 7,000 shareholders. The flotation enabled the company to expand rapidly and so by the end of 2001, the company was operating throughout the 15 countries of the European Union plus Norway, Switzerland and India. During that time significant investment was put into creating the StepStone brand and to-day the company is positioned as Europe’s leading independent online recruitment company.

TWST: What do you believe is the growth potential of these markets moving forward?

Mr. Tenwick: A few weeks ago we signed an agreement with CVO Group, who are the leading online recruitment company for Eastern Europe. I think potentially Eastern Europe is a very exciting space, particularly because of the fact that we will ultimately see the European market expand. It also means that we now have a reach in 22 countries within the StepStone Network, so I believe that we are now able to offer an unrivaled coverage of the European market. In terms of other types of the markets, rather than geographic, we will, I think, see increasing demands from the small and medium sized businesses for much more proactive talent management. The ability of companies to manage and attract talent to their businesses is still quite an underrated feature, and solving that problem is something that StepStone will be playing a leading role in going forward.

TWST: What can you highlight on the company’s agenda moving forward over the next 12-24 months?

Mr. Tenwick: Our first priority over the next 12-24 months is to make the company profitable and then continue to grow. I think that we will achieve that by really leveraging our pan-European coverage and maintaining our very strong position as number one in each of the markets in which we operate. Independent market research shows that we are the Number one online recruitment company in Europe and we are determined to capitalize on that position. We will be expanding the range of services, as I alluded to before, and we will be getting a broader range of value services for customers to continue using online as their preferred recruitment method. As each year passes, we get more and more CVs and more data and more relevant candidates, so I think what we are seeing is an early stage market, which has taken a short-term slowdown as a result of an economic cycle. I am convinced that on-line recruitment is the way ahead for employers and candidates but in Europe we are still in the early stages of the maturity of that market.