:: PURPLEPASSPORT IS ACQUIRED BY iPROFILE, THE COMPANY REDEFINING THE JOB SEEKING AND CAREER MANAGEMENT PROCESS, CAPITALISING UPON iPROFILE'S ENORMOUS POTENTIAL FOR BUSINESS GROWTH.
London, 30 April, 2008: iProfile (www.iprofile.org) today announced the acquisition of PurplePassport (www.purplepassport.com) in a strategic move that strengthens its position as the company redefining the job seeking and career management process. This acquisition will benefit over 2.3 million people who have already replaced their traditional CV with an iProfile, a dynamic profile for professionals, and the millions more who are set to make the switch. The acquired PurplePassport technology enables recruiters and employers to instantly view candidate's skills, achievements and training history, thus ensuring an even quicker assessment of a candidate's qualifications and suitability for a particular role.
iProfile will incorporate the Purple Passport's flagship 'Skills Passport' product, which has been adopted by five Government appointed Sector Skills Councils who have a combined footprint covering more than 10 million people. Integrating it with its existing offering, employees and jobseekers can create a single, dynamic online profile that now features all their qualifications and training achievements which can be validated by registered verifiers. Many leading recruiters have adopted iProfile as the online CV of choice. With PurplePassport the iProfile will allow candidates to build a powerful, confirmed and validated record of their skill-set and achievements, plan their personal development and share information with employers and training providers.
Rick Bacon, CEO of iProfile, comments: "The acquisition of PurplePassport is an important move for us in capitalising upon iProfile's enormous potential for business growth by giving us access to a larger market. We are gaining valuable insight into important aspects of personal development and the 'learning community', including the Sector Skills Councils. The iProfile is already making waves in the recruitment space and companies are starting to gear up for the next progression in dynamic skills management. Today there is no reason why jobseekers should continue to use a CV template when they can benefit from the iProfile, the dynamic profile for professionals."
Mark Callahan, founder of Purple Passport, added: “We’re delighted to be joining forces with iProfile as there are clear benefits for employees, job seekers and employers in integrating the two products. iProfile has already had huge success in the UK as professionals realise that an online, dynamic profile can put them one step ahead in their job search. Joining this with Purple Passport’s expertise in recording employees’ skills and tracking personal development will further benefit employers and training providers. This will also play a role in tackling our partners’ current skills shortage by helping them identify skills gaps. The Leitch report of December 2006 highlighted that the UK urgently needs to raise achievements at all levels of skills. We can now address this by capturing all training and achievements on their iProfile, and identify areas in which employees require training to fill the skills gaps. It helps avoid unnecessary and often expensive retraining because all achievements are verified by a credited source.”
iProfile (www.iprofile.org) encourages jobseekers to convert their CV to a dynamic professional profile. It is easy to set up and update, with the added benefits of enabling complete control over the job-seeking process and ensuring feedback from recruiters and hiring managers on the relevant job opportunities. The iProfile has been adopted by many of the UK's biggest recruiters, including Hays IT, Reed, Spring and Alexander Mann with the 2005 Key Note IT Recruitment Market Assessment reporting that it "has become the industry standard format for online CVs."
All information held on an Purple Passport is verified by any one of a network of 'registered verifiers', which consist of employers, training providers, awarding bodies, colleges and universities. Both the individual and employer can continue to update it during the period of employment. This added capability for dynamic skills management will help move the recruitment industry forward in effectively assessing and utilising candidates' skills.
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