SThree chief executive Russell Clements (pictured) has pledged to take on rival Spring by focusing on smaller companies rather than corporate giants.

The firm, which joined the stock exchange last week, is worth £273m. Its closest rival in the specialist IT staffing market, Spring, is worth £93m.

Unlike the Spring brand model, SThree is a holding company overseeing 12 brands, with the three largest being Computer Futures, Progressive and Huxley.

Clements told Recruiter that listing the firm had been a long-term priority.

“It has been our intention to float for a long time. We came close to it in 2001, but the bad state of the IT market intervened,” he said.

Clements believes that the company’s recruitment policy has been a key to its success.

“We tend not to recruit people from other companies. We only take on graduates and grow our own,” said Clements.

“When it comes to recruiting the next generation of graduates, we think that our status as a public company will help.”

Clements also compared the firm’s success with the well-documented troubles of rival Spring, which recorded a £5m loss before tax in October.

“We are the opposite of Spring. We have a much wider spread of clients. Our largest customer contributes to 2% of our gross profit.”

Spring declined to comment.