Schematic Isn’t Just Leading Audience to Link to Lotion

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L.A.-based Schematic is a Web design firm, an ad agency and a tech company rolled into one.


It is the creator of ABC’s online full episode player, Vogue’s Shopvogue.tv and Coca Cola Creator, a user-generated art gallery around the popular brand. It has shown that it can create content, draw traffic, build community and optimize e-commerce on Web sites.


That impressive track record paid off recently when it was acquired for an undisclosed price by WPP Group, an advertising and marketing giant that also owns 243 companies including Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide and 141 WorldWide.


“We invent new ways of doing business. We are rarely brought in to do re-design,” said Trevor Kaufman, Schematic’s chief executive, in a cell phone conversation from a New York restaurant where he was celebrating the acquisition.


Schematic brought in $36 million in the fiscal year ending August and expects $40 million in revenues this year.


The company of 275 employees 130 in Los Angeles includes art directors, writers, marketing managers, information architects and code writers. They’ve most recently been charged with making Target.com a more compelling destination.


“Rather than just leading an audience to a link for a lotion, for example, we might develop content on spa products that resemble a magazine page,” Kaufman said. “Many of our customers are large organizations with a very rich, real-world presence. We help answer the question of why people would want to go online to find them.”


The client list is exhaustive. It includes Disney, NBC Universal, Nokia, Coca-Cola, Comcast, CondeNast, Time Warner Inc., Panasonic and TBS.


The company is in hiring mode. “We want to be more of the same, just bigger,” Kaufman said.



Cash Infusion

Cornerstone On-Demand Inc., which automates human resource management for companies, has received $32 million in new funding.


Its Internet-based software tools provide digital orientations for new employees, track yearly performance reviews online and offer 30,000 different types of online training sessions.


The company services mostly Fortune 1000 companies, including Aon, Barnes & Noble, DirecTV, Honda, Pitney Bowes and Smith Barney.


For example, DirecTV is directing 5,000 of its newly hired employees through an online orientation program provided through Cornerstone’s platforms, said Adam Miller, the company’s chief executive.


Cornerstone also creates tools where performance reviews are documented online throughout the year.


“One of the problems with performance review is that you’re typically reviewed for what you’ve done in the last month or two instead of what you did 12 month ago,” Miller said. “You could write it down on Post-It notes, but you’ll lose it.”


This is the first time the Santa Monica company of 100 employees has received a significant investment since it began eight years ago. The recent backing was provided by Bessemer Venture Partners and Bay Partners. Byron Deeter, a partner at Bessemer, and Neil Sadaranganey, a partner at Bay, will join the company’s board.


Cornerstone will use the funds to triple its sales force, open offices around the world and build a network of resellers.



Executive Shuffle

Two major tech companies in L.A. have new chief financial officers.


Scott Ray, former chief financial officer of ValueClick Inc., has gone to nearby Woodland Hills-based United Online, an Internet dial-up provider that operates NetZero and Juno.


The vacancy left by Ray at Westlake Village-based ValueClick, one of the nation’s top independent online advertising networks, has been filled by John Pitstick, who has been a senior member of the company’s finance team since joining the company in 2005.



As the Tide Turns

GoTV Networks, a major mobile content creator based in Sherman Oaks, has launched a new series for the Tide detergent brand.

Called “Crescent Heights,” the comedy episodes feature country girl Ashley, who has recently moved to Los Angeles from Wisconsin. The show, branded by Procter & Gamble’s 60-year-old trademark detergent, will be featured on Tide.com and available to GoTV’s subscribers through AT & T;, Verizon Wireless, Sprint Nextel, Alltel, Helio and Boost Mobile.



Staff reporter Booyeon Lee can be reached at (323) 549-5225, ext. 230, or at [email protected].

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