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20 May 2025
Oil & gas/Energy, Transport & logistics

International manufacturer invests £170m in North Wales facility

The UK and Welsh governments have welcomed the investment into a new facility from the international manufacturer.

The announcement comes as the UK and EU hold a summit to discuss future opportunities to boost economic growth.

The landmark development will produce more than 100,000 tonnes of non-combustible rock mineral wool insulation per year and create around 140 direct jobs, with more in local supply chains.

The announcement coincides with the UK-EU Summit that took place on Monday [19 May 2025].

Secretary of state for Wales Jo Stevens said: “This £170m investment by Knauf Insulation is fantastic news for North Wales and our UK government mission to drive economic growth.”

Using UK-First Submerged Arc Furnace technology, the new factory will produce non-combustible, low embodied carbon, recyclable rock mineral wool insulation to support the need for safer, more energy efficient and sustainable buildings.

The UK and Welsh government-backed North Wales Growth Deal and the Flintshire and Wrexham Investment Zone collectively support the decision by Knauf Insulation to lo-cate a second plant in the area.

As leaders in the production of sustainable building materials, Knauf Insulation’s expansion further supports the growing advanced manufacturing cluster in North Wales.

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20 May 2025
Creative/Digital/Media, IT/Telecoms

Human skills as important as ‘oven-ready’ tech skills

So says the CEO of the CIPD, the UK’s professional body for HR, learning & development, Peter Cheese.

Speaking last Friday [16 May 2025] at the Houses of Parliament launch of the UK Hiring Taskforce, Cheese told the 200 attendees that at the same time, however, instead of filling skills gaps, employers are also looking for potential in applicants through characteristics such as “attitude, aptitude to learn human skills like collaboration and communication, and critical thinking. The more we debate the future of work, the more we debate about AI impacting jobs and skills in the future, the more we are coming back to these core skills”.

Humanities knowledge is part of building such capabilities into organisations, Cheese said: “People talk now about the half-life of job skills is somewhere between three and four years. In other words, every three or four years, we’re going to have to retrain half of our workforce.”

Access to and retention of talent are a top issue for business leaders around the world, with “almost every organisation saying they can’t find all the skills. But then you question them on that, they say yes, we’ve been getting too focused on hiring what I’ve often described as ‘oven-ready employees’ and they don’t exist – partly because we are changing the nature of jobs at an ever-increasing rate”, Cheese said. “So, the reality of how we approach recruiting has got to be expanded from the point of view of the employers as well.”

He asked the audience: “So why do we seem to be reverting back to saying ‘I just want tech skills’? We know the world is not, unfortunately, going to be a better place if all we have are a lot of tech people. Frankly, we need humanity to work alongside that as well.”

Cheese has been appointed to the UK Hiring Taskforce steering committee.

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19 May 2025
Life sciences, Creative/Digital/Media

UK Hiring Taskforce launches to develop new hiring strategies

With 200 hiring leaders, recruiters, rec tech leaders and more in attendance, including Recruiter, the hiring taskforce kick-off also delivered the news that an association for recruitment technology providers is planned to launch in November “to have one voice with government, to give high risk assurance that they are people of good standing and to help us develop a rec tech roadmap”, said Keith Rosser, who as chair of the Better Hiring Institute is leading the joint force of parliamentarians and hiring leaders. 

“We want a national hiring strategy,” Rosser said in his address at the event. “What do we think the future looks like if we could start again – forget the baggage, forget the medieval CVs, the Victorian references, the industrial revolution, job adverts – and think about actually, what would starting again look like?

“And finally, a technology road map. What would rec tech look like if we had a magic wand? What do we need to consider? What do we need to debate?... What we want from you is your help shaping what needs to be considered, how we need to go forward, what are the things we really should be looking at?”

Organisers are hoping to gather concepts by November from the respective work groups, formed of people who sign up to participate, for strategy, technology and policy. “Those three work streams with then end in those three deliverables later in the year,” Rosser said.

“We want this to be the beginning of a new dawn,” he added. “We want to get leadership once more for the UK in hiring… It’s hard to imagine actually that once upon a time, the UK was a leader in this stuff… We just really haven’t moved forward. Today is our commitment to gain leadership once more.”

Viscount Camrose, shadow secretary of state for science, innovation and technology, will be the honorary president of the rec tech association when formed. 

Speaking on Friday at the taskforce launch, he said: “I’ve been worrying for years that the job market is too inefficient, but that it can be reduced in some sense, to a data problem. And I would love us to start making progress together in that director because actually, in a weird way, although it is a data problem, digitalisation and AI have made it worse. They have made it more difficult rather than less difficult, and I think we can go for some way this afternoon to starting that journey to correcting the problem.”

As examples, Viscount Camrose said: “Far too many jobs are far too overapplied; we see candidates receiving no response – even late on in the process, no response comes. And there are such huge advantages to all of us for doing that. First… if we are going to grow as an economy, we need to be more productive… and just placing people in jobs to which they are genuinely committed is going to boost productivity. 

“Second, economic inactivity. We have too many people who are economically inactive now, and how many of those people remain economically inactive because… it’s just too difficult to embark on the process of finding the next job. The easier we can make it [is] to everybody’s benefit. The third advantage is just national happiness.”

Also speaking at the event was Lord Chris Holmes, Paralympian swimming champion, who in 2023 introduced an AI regulation bill to address concerns about its development, fairness in use, privacy and other issues. He has since reintroduced it, terming it “light touch, right size regulation”, and believing that it has significant potential application in hiring. “If we get fairer hiring, if we get faster hiring, the aim for all of us today and for every day, we can truly have in the world the finest hiring ecosystem we can bring to bear,” he said.

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14 May 2025
Creative/Digital/Media, Engineering

NEW TO THE MARKET: 12-16 MAY 2025

• Global specialist recruitment company Eames Consulting has opened a new office in Philadelphia, focusing on technology and digital enablement. Located at the Wanamaker Building, 100 East Penn Square, this is the recruiter’s second US location, following its New York office, which opened in 2022. The Philadelphia team will be headed up by Steven Stahl, a highly experienced recruiter. Also joining are Sam Youngberg (managing consultant) and Callum Stainer (senior consultant), data and AI recruitment specialists.

• Eightfold AI, which helps organisations recruit and retain top talent, and upskill/reskill their entire workforce, has added two new foundational AI products to its portfolio. Expanding its capabilities in talent acquisition, Eightfold introduces AI Interviewer to automate candidate engagement and assessment, enhancing responsiveness and selection outcomes. The company has also launched Digital Twin, a personalised AI model that captures and applies employee knowledge across systems to drive real-time productivity and decision-making.

• SF Recruitment has opened a new East Midlands headquarters in Castle Donington, strategically positioned next to East Midlands Airport. The new hub unites the company’s Leicester and Nottingham teams, with the company broadening its expertise into STEM fields, including technology and engineering, alongside its core areas of finance, private equity and corporate services. Over 40 team members will be based at the new headquarters and plans for European growth are underway, according to the company statement.

30 October 2017
Rec-to-rec, Transport & logistics, Creative/Digital/Media, Engineering, Construction & property, Commercial & office support, Legal, Executive search, IT/Telecoms, Accounting/Finance

NEW TO THE MARKET: 30 OCTOBER-3 NOVEMBER 2017

• Global recruiter Antal International has expanded its operations in China with opening of an office in Guangzhou. The Guangzhou office, which recruits into the automotive, insurance, manufacturing and technology sectors, follows the opening of Dalian and Wuhan offices in October and August 2017.

Antal Dalian covers general insurance, life & health insurance, and reinsurance appointments. Antal Wuhan office helps clients to recruit automotive, IT, property and banking professionals.

• Blue Legal has launched its first overseas office, adding New York to its Manchester and London bases. The agency, which serves the legal, accountancy, property and consultancy sectors, said the US operation is an extension of its European and Asia presence to support its global clients.

• Search firm Careers International has opened an office in Hong Kong. Philip Hutchinson, who will also be responsible for growing Careers International’s global banking practice throughout the Asia Pacific region, heads up the new offices.

• The Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport (CILT) is to host its first LIVE Virtual Careers Fair. This interactive Careers Fair will be streamed live on CILT’s Facebook page on Wednesday 22 November at 18:00.

The fair will include presentations, live talks and question & answer opportunities. It’s free to register and open to all students looking for a career in logistics and transport.

Students will be able to interact with recruiters, organisations and industry professionals, and learn more about the opportunities available within the sector.

Companies including DHL Supply Chain, Sainsbury’s, Logistics Learning Alliance and XPO Logistics will answer questions directly in real time using online chat technology.

• Procurement and supply chain staffing specialist DSJ Global, a Phaidon International company, has opened an office in Hong Kong. The office, which has its official launch today [1 November], will recruit for procurement, supply chain & logistics, operational excellence, CFO/finance functions and HR roles.

• Technology and professional services staffing specialist Eurostaff is opening its second office in the city of Berlin. The new location is parent company Staffgroup’s third premises in Germany, with the Earthstaff brand based in Hamburg.

Having opened in a three-man office in February 2013, Eurostaff’s Berlin operation is now a 75-person business. The firm says this latest expansion has been driven by demand for talent in the innovative engineering space. Wasilij Korotchenko, who heads up Eurostaff’s engineering team in Germany, will head up this new office.

• Global IT sales and digital recruitment company Finlay James has opened an office in Downtown San Francisco. Vice president of US operations Nick Guy will be spearheading the new venture, based in the WeWork offices at 650 California Street.

• Team GB triathlete Shayne Wilson has launched rec-to-rec Kanso Recruitment. The business is based in Manchester City Centre and supports recruitment business across the North-West and London.

Wilson qualified to represent Team GB in Triathlon earlier this year.

• UK payroll provider RACS Group is divesting from the umbrella model and has launched a new Professional Employer Organisation (PEO) service suite.

PEO, which is fee-free for contractors, streamlines processes and brings together a range of benefits, which sees contractors gain access to their earnings in advance of their scheduled pay day and the real-time matching of contractors’ competencies and availability with suitable temporary work.

23 October 2017
Creative/Digital/Media, Construction & property, Commercial & office support, IT/Telecoms, HR

NEW TO THE MARKET: 23-27 OCTOBER 2017

• Specialist recruitment and training agency Acorn has opened a new branch in Bridgwater in Woodlands Business Park. This new branch is one of two new locations in the South-West, with another office set to open in Bournemouth.

Newly appointed commercial development manager Matthew Hastie has been brought in to manage both the Bournemouth and Bridgwater offices.

• Recruitment giant Adecco has joined forces with multinational Microsoft to launch technology start-up YOSS. The freelancer platform, launched this week, has been custom built to specifically facilitate the relationship between freelancers and enterprises.

• Global human capital management solutions provider ADP has rolled out its cloud-based human capital management system ADP iHCM 2 in Germany, Italy, Netherlands and the UK.

The solution aims to simplify and streamline HR processes for pay, talent acquisition, time management, performance management, development and training, as well as tools for HR administration, reporting and analysis.

• Kalcrest Site Services has announced its return to Bradford. The construction recruiter launched in Bradford in 2003 before moving to Rotherham in 2011.

• Digital staffing specialist Propel London has moved to larger offices at 55 Greek Street in the heart of the capital’s West End as part of its expansion plans.

18 October 2017
IT/Telecoms, HR

Start-up of the Month: LUCKYLINK's EVA

Recruitment app provider LUCKYLINK has launched EVA (Employment Virtual Assistant) – a recruiter bot hardwired with artificial intelligence, which has the knowledge of a recruitment executive with two years’ experience.

Officially launched in October, EVA can source and present five suitable candidates in less than five days following a 10-minute brief from an employer.

But LUCKYLINK founder Ben Kaminsky told Recruiter EVA doesn’t spell the end for companies using human recruitment consultants. “The idea is to make the consultant role truly relationship driven, to reward behaviours that build and develop deeper connections with candidates and clients. 

“The scalability and cost effectiveness of this platform mean it will very quickly challenge in-house teams for both total cost to hire and longevity of placement. Our algorithms get better the more you use us resulting in higher success rate of placements with clients as the relationship matures.

“It costs the same to recruit a permanent hourly paid worker through us as it does to hire an agency temp for two-and-a-half weeks for the same role.”

EVA has already gained 15 customers to date, however Kaminsky said the aim is to expand its use across the whole recruitment lifecycle. 

“There are huge opportunities for automating the day-to-day tasks carried out by recruiters,” he added.

16 October 2017
IT/Telecoms

Nicoll Curtin buys cyber experts BeecherMadden

Led by managing director Karla Jobling (pictured above), BeecherMadden has been in the cyber security market for seven years, with offices in London and New York. Speaking exclusively to Recruiter, Jobling said: “We hit the cyber market at the right time.” The company has a strong presence in the cyber consultancy market, providing cyber specialists to a variety of industry sectors.

Nicoll Curtin CEO James Johnson told Recruiter that he and Jobling were introduced by industry expert Graeme Reid, leading to a year-and-a-half worth of conversations and finally, the acquisition.

“They were the right people in the right market,” Johnson said of BeecherMadden. “It’s a really exciting market,” he went on to say, predicting that cyber security recruitment had not even reached a small percentage of “what it will be in time” across UK and international markets.

Jobling said that her own emphasis on salaries, women and diversity had helped boost the profile of her business. A key talent pool that businesses miss out on is that of people returning to work after career breaks, she said. Given that 50% of jobs in the cyber market go unfilled, she urges employers to look at returners with, for instance, project management skills who can be trained in cyber disciplines.  

Also, she said, greater awareness is needed of the potential in cyber careers. “People are put off by the image of a teenager in a hoodie,” she said.

Jobling is one of a team of 12 that has already moved into Nicoll Curtin quarters.

The deal was executed by the immediate parties, with no external advisers. Jobling said: “I was surprised how easy the process was. The integrity is strong.”

Earlier this year, Nicoll Curtin launched digital recruiter Purple Halo.

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