Employment Hero and key investor Seek end legal hostilities

The bitter legal battle by HR platform Employment Hero against investor Seek has ended with the combatants releasing a terse mutual announcement today to kiss and make up and discontiue proceedings.

The stoush began last July after Seek announced it would terminate aceess to its API (application program interface) to post jobs on the Employment Hero platform. 

The scaleup unicorn accused the ASX-listed business of anti‑competitive behaviour and sought an interim injunction in the Federal Court to prevent it being cut off. The termination was put on hold as proceedings rumbled on.

Seek believed Employed Hero was turning into a competitor after expanding its remit to recruitment and alleged that it was misusing candidate data in its access to the Seek API to expand its own database of potential candidates to compete, in breach of the original 2022 agreement.

Seek is worth around $8.3 billion and is a large investor in Employment Hero, which is valued at more than $2 billion.

The deal negotiated outside of court delivers a win to Employment Hero, restoring access to the API, which customers use to post jobs on Seek via Employment Hero, in return for backing down on claims that the jobs giant was being anti-competitive.

The warring parties left it to spokespeople to comment, adding that neither side will make any further comment about the proceedings or their resolution.

“Employment Hero now accepts that Seek’s purpose in issuing the notice on 24 June 2025 terminating Employment Hero’s access to Seek’s API was not one of substantially lessening competition, as Employment Hero originally believed, and has agreed to resolve the proceedings,” the compan spokesperson said.

“Seek is pleased that the litigation has now ended and is satisfied with the outcome,” Seek said.

Court claims lift lid

The initial legal skirmish nonetheless provided some insight into how the two sides were collaborating and competing via court documents.

Employment Hero had claimed that as far back as April 2022, the two parties were discussing a joint venture, but it was abandoned because Seek said didn’t do business with rivals.

But in July 2024, JV discussions resumed, it seems with the blessing of Seek cofounder and director Andrew Bassat, and Employment Hero CEO and founder Ben Thompson.

In court documents, Employment Hero claimed Seek wanted to exclusive ownership of candidates profiles and that relation in recruitment activity, with the scaleup blocked from competing with job recommendations or offers, in return for revenue share.

“The requirement that Seek provide all recruitment services to the exclusion of Employment Hero was a sticking point, and communications became strained by September 2024,” Employment Hero claimed, going on to allege that terminating API access was first threatened in October 2024.

Seek followed through in June 2025, telling Thompson it was revoking access. Employment Hero alleged a Seek executive told them: “It harms our brand and reputation to integrate with competitors”.

Seek would later claim that it found August 2024 that its data was being misused because Employment Hero’s app, Swag, has a jobs board, and when candidates signed up for it, their profile was partly populated with data from Seek.

“The use of Seek candidate information in this way was a breach of Employment Hero’s obligations,” Seek said in could filings, adding that it potentially misled Seek candidates and undermined trust in their company.

“Seek also considered that Employment Hero was misusing its access to the Seek API as a means of expanding its own database of potential candidates to improperly enhance its ability to compete.”