Taleo Corporation announces 2004 Momentum

Taleo, a company focused solely on talent management solutions, and third largest pure-play SSP (Software Service Provider) based on revenue, (after Salesforce.com and Altiris), today announced its 2004 achievements in customer value creation, customer acquisition, growth recognition, product launches and technology infrastructure. Taleoís success underscores both its vision and ability to execute, and marketplace demand: Leading organisations around the world are focused on talent management strategies to attain business goals. Attracting, assessing, hiring, retaining, and optimally assigning top-quality talent is paramount for financial success across all industries.

Taleo solutions average between seven and nine million http transactions per day, and process approximately 33,000 hires per month for its customer base of leading Global 2000 organisations serving financial services, healthcare, manufacturing, retail, and many other industries. The companyís solutions are employed in 87 countries and attract candidates from 190 of the worldís 193 countries and independent states. The company reports that it serves approximately 400,000 business users and maintains 21 million candidate and employee profiles in its database, which is segregated by customer. Taleo currently serves three of the top five commercial banks in the world, two of the top three pharmaceutical companies, three of the top four personal care product manufacturers, and three of the top four professional services firms, according to Fortune 500 listings.

New Taleo customers in 2004 include: Academy Sports; Accenture; ADP; Baylor Health Care; Best Buy; Cendant Corporation; Citigroup; Cintas; Fujitsu; Holden; ING; Johnson Controls; Mars, Inc.; OfficeMax; Roche; Sara Lee; SHRM (Society for Human Resource Management); Siebel; Timken Company; Tenet; Talent Zone; and Westpac; among others.

ìThe past year was very significant for Taleo, beginning with our name change from Recruitsoft in March 2004, to our product launches, user adoption and new customer sales, but most importantly, due to the value our customers are generating from their talent management initiatives. This is the fulfilment of our mission and is possible only through our employing what we consider to be the industryís best people and the worldís best technology,î said Taleo Chairman and CEO Louis Tetu. ìIt has been rewarding to all of our employees to receive so much recognition during 2004. A key recognition of which we are particularly proud is the choice of Taleo solutions to manage the membership of the Society of Human Resources Management (SHRM), the worldís leading Human Resources professional organisation.î

Taleo Customer Value Creation. During 2004, Taleoís research division iLogos conducted extensive studies into the financial impact of talent management initiatives attributable to technology for several Taleo customers, through its Value Based Talent Measurement (VBTM) programme, which has been validated by third-party experts. Results ranged from benefit of GB 642,000 per year for the Canadian operations of Mosaic Sales Solutions to approximately GB11 million per year for leading science and technology company Dow Chemical. These results have also been validated by the financial departments of the customer companies.

Dow Chemical. According to Jon Walker, global leader of human resources technology for Dow, ìWith Taleo we have improved our global business processes, resulting in a 3/4 Sigma process improvement, in addition to a 30 percent reduction in staffing costs as well as significant value creation through the reinvestment of working capital. Over a five-year period, this equates to nearly 10 cents per share increase for our company. These, we feel, are very conservative numbers and we expect them to grow over time.î

Mosaic Canada. Mosaic Canada is a leading field sales and marketing company that employs field specialists at retail department and specialty stores, banks, events and small businesses. Mosaic Canada President Tony Lasorda said, ìAfter using Taleo for nearly two years, we completed a comprehensive audit to measure our results. In the first year alone the value creation was $1.2 million CAD, which will equate, over a five year period, to $8 million CAD.î He continued, ìWe are clearly finding candidates that are better fits for our organisation, which has had an impact on retention, costs and productivity.î

ìClearly, our clients are benefiting from driving performance through effective talent management with Taleo solutions,î said Tetu.

New product launches lead the industry. During 2004 Taleo launched a number of new solutions, including:

Taleo Assessment, the industryís first built-in, flexible assessment solution;

Taleo Workforce Project, to manage large projects using contract staff;

Taleo Retail, designed specifically to manage the unique staffing needs of retail organisations;

Taleo ACE Benchmarking, to measure enterprise staffing performance; and

Taleo Integration, which includes integrations to preferred staffing solution partners through its Partner Staffing Services programme and toolkits for integrations to ERPs and other customer legacy systems.

In addition, Taleo launched Version 6.1 of its Enterprise Talent Management Suite of solutions in 2004. Enhancements in this version include interview scheduling, the availability of conceptual search capabilities, Manager WebTop enhancements specifically aimed at supporting the talent management processes of managers working in decentralized environments, particularly retail or district managers. Also, Version 6.1 includes enhancements for Taleoís Regulatory and Diversity solution as well as enhanced integration capabilities.

Hyatt Hotels & Resorts Director of Corporate Recruiting Susan Steffy said, ìAs a leader in the hospitality industry, it is important for us to have a highly integrated way to manage our diverse processes, and Taleo clearly understands our business needs as evidenced in Version 6.1. The enhancements in the Taleo Integration solution for 6.1 are highly configurable, adhere to industry standards and will work to further increase productivity and decrease costs at Hyatt.î

Global recognition. Taleo received a number of recognitions during 2004, for its growth, products, and innovation:

Taleoís 5-year growth rate was recognized by the Deloitte Fast 500 and Fast 50-Silicon Valley.

Taleo was ranked as the 11th and 7th fastest growing technology company in North America and in Silicon Valley, respectively.

Taleo was ranked as the 23rd fastest growing private company in the San Francisco Business Timesí annual listing of the Top 100 Fastest Growing Private Companies in the Bay Area.

Taleo was ranked the 10th largest private company in the Bay Area, based on 2003 revenues of $43.6 million. The award was co-presented by the San Francisco Business Times and PriceWaterhouseCoopers.

Software Magazineís list of the worldís foremost software and services providers, ranked Taleo Corporation 265 of 500, based on 2003 software and services revenue.

The Taleo Assessment solution, launched in 2004, was named HR Executive Magazineís 2004 Top Ten Product of the Year, based on the value it brings to organisations and its high level of innovation.

The 2004 Human Resource Technology Excellence Award was presented to Taleo for its creative and innovative development of HR technology in the areas of workforce planning, recruiting, staffing, and human capital, by the International Quality and Productivity Center during its HR Tech 2004 Conference.

IDC and HRO Today presented Taleo with the 2004 TecHR Award for its recruiting and staffing process and content-delivery technologies during the 2004 TecHR World Conference and Expo.

Taleo significantly expanded operations in 2004 internationally as well as in North America. In Europe, the company appointed Managing Director Michael Hunt, and expanded its consulting, alliances and marketing staff in both Europe and Asia-Pacific.