Speaking to BusinessDay after Freelancer’s posted a $729,000 after tax loss for the six months to June 30, Matt Barrie said that aggressive expansion had further highlighted the need for more STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) skills.

“Finding high-quality people is a challenge in any business, in any lifecycle,” Mr Barrie said. “But for us, where we’re hiring very smart computer scientists by the metric tonne, it is a tough issue in Australia.”

While finding the right people for the business is made a little easier by having operations in four countries, it is still a challenge.

GROWTH INITIATIVES

The loss for the first half compared with a $478,000 profit in the year-earlier period. The loss was expected, as the company is pumping money into growth initiatives. While revenue rose 51 per cent to $11.9 million – which Freelancer chief executive Mr Barrie said was “extremely pleasing” – costs increased significantly as the business scaled up its existing operations in Australia, Philippines, UK and Canada. Full-time equivalents increased 18 per cent in the six months since December.

Freelancer dished out $3.6 million on three acquisitions, the biggest being the $US3.2 billion ($3.5 million) purchase of the digital marketing community and marketplace Warrior Forum.

Mr Barrie remains upbeat on the company’s outlook.

“To me, it feels like it’s eBay in 1997. There is going be a global marketplace for services that’s going to be of substantial size and scale.”

Freelancer shares closed 2.7 per cent lower at 72¢.

IBRS adviser Guy Cranswick said Freelancer was right to be bullish, but the considerable costs in acquisitions, headcount and the wages bill meant management may need to be vigilant in monitoring costs.

“These results are good in the growth ledger in terms of new users, revenues and what should mean for the future if it’s managed well,” Mr Cranswick said.

SOME CHALLENGES

Freelancer has a huge advantage by being ahead of the competition, Mr Cranswick said, but cost pressure and keeping users active will be something that can challenge them.

“We may see a shake-out in that the others may be acquired by Freelancer, or merge to gain greater scale and be able to maintain their competitive edge.

Freelancer has big expansion plans in mind, having already hired people from Expedia and Domain.

Last week, Freelancer moved to new offices, in Sydney’s World Square, double the size of its previous office, at 1800 metres squared.

Freelancer’s first office was at the back of Mr Barrie’s house. The company registered a 54 per cent uptick in users compared with the year earlier.

The company owns 40 similar sites around the world, including Freelancer.co.uk in Britain.

Mr Barrie said he has no plans to tap investors for funds by offering more shares. Freelancer is tightly held, with just 43.3 million shares, or 9.9 per cent, on open float.

Mr Barrie holds 46 per cent of the company, while Simon Clausen, a Freelancer director and technology venture capitalist, owns 38 per cent through a holding company.

“We’re very happy running the business how we’re running it. We bootstrapped the entire business all the way to the IPO for five years, so we have no need to raise any funds,” he said.