Profusion Group and Primary Asset Consulting to merge.

Profusion Group and Primary Asset Consulting merge to create Australia’s largest banking and financial services executive search and recruitment firm.

In a move that marks the creation of the largest provider of recruitment and executive search services to the Banking and Financial Services sector in Australia, Profusion Group (Profusion) and Primary Asset Consulting (PAC) yesterday announced that they will merge, effective 3 July 2014. The new entity will be known as Profusion PAC Pty Ltd and will be trading as Profusion Group, with executive search to be carried out by a specialist arm of the company, PAC executive.

Speaking about the decision of the two long-time competitors to merge, CEO of Profusion, Rod Jones, said that both companies agreed that staying at the forefront of the industry meant taking proactive steps to respond to the changing market landscape.

“Over the past six years, the human capital sector globally has experienced an unprecedented period of change,” Mr Jones explained. “The rapid evolution of technology has enabled the development of a significant internal talent management capability within our customer base, including the growth of Recruitment Process Outsourcing (RPO) models and a move towards offshoring of human resources functions. While challenging traditional paradigms around the delivery of human capital solutions we recognised that it was an opportunity for us to leverage off our combined expertise and networks.”

“Despite being fierce competitors, Profusion and PAC have always had a healthy level of respect for each other” said David Dawson, Managing Director of PAC. “Both companies were looking to the future in terms of operating models, growth of employee numbers and locations, as well as a substantial investment in technology and infrastructure. The synergies of where both businesses were moving was too strong to ignore and we knew we could achieve significantly more working together, than as competitors,” he said.

In the new business Rod Jones will become the Group Chief Executive Officer, and the role of Managing Director will be filled by David Dawson. Mr Dawson will also act as Head of Business Development.

Mr Jones has said a key objective of the merge, is to minimise disruption to existing business operations and clients. “Ashton Bilbie and Alison Loader will continue to run the recruitment business here in Australia and Craig Michilis will retain oversight for our regional operations based out of Singapore. Our executive search practices will come together as one and will be headed up by Simone Mears and Greg Kirk. This combined team will bring together the collective strengths of our search team which also includes Emma Armstrong in Sydney, Garry Medland and John Pappas in Melbourne.

“In addition, the merger provides an opportunity for a significant expansion of the consulting services the two firms currently provide; under the banner of PAC Executive we will be launching a highly innovative and unique package of developmental programs. We are really excited about the potential of this business and the impact it will have in the market,” he said.

In conclusion Mr Jones said that both companies have been founded on very similar principles, sharing a passion for quality sourcing strategies and the way in which good advice is provided to drive the transformation of individuals, teams and organisations for the better.

“We look forward to building on our successes as a joint entity. We are really excited about the opportunities that this merger opens up for our business as well as for our key stakeholders. Really – that’s the definition of a win-win outcome,” Mr Jones said.

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