Company story

Freelancer Technology Pty. Limited is an Australian private company founded in October 2010. This Australian company provides an online job marketplace for employers and freelancers around the globe.

Current status

According to the official website of the Australian Business Register, Freelancer Technology Pty. Limited was incorporated on October 12, 2010. As of December 2019, the company is active and doing business from the NSW 2009 area code in Sydney. The Australian Business Number (ABN) used to identify Freelancer Technology as a company registered in Australia is 21-142-189-759.

Freelancer Technology went public in November 2013. The IPO date, the date Freelancer Technology went public, is November 15, 2013. As of December 2019, Freelancer Technology Pty. Limited is trading as Freelancer Technology on the Australian Securities Exchange under the stock symbol ASX:FLN.

Origins of Freelancer Technology Pty. Limited

Matt Barrie founded Freelancer.com

Robert Matthew “Matt” Barrie is an Australian entrepreneur and the founder of Freelancer Technology Pty. Limited. According to Crunchbase, Barrie founded Freelancer.com on May 1, 2009, over a year before the company incorporated.

In an interview with Jungleworks, Barrie recounted his personal motivation for starting the business. He said,

“I started Freelancer when I had a first hand experience at how fast and convenient it was to hire a freelancer online. I needed to get some data entry done and I’d been asking around for help but couldn’t find anyone to do the job. I thought it would be the perfect job for a university student and was paying $2000, but nobody I knew wanted to do it. In desperation, I checked online and found GetAFreelancer where I could post a project and hire a freelancer. In a couple of days, I received numerous bids. The data entry that I’d been trying to get done for months was completed by a freelancer in just a few days. I saw the huge potential behind this experience. I realized that the next big thing is to build an eBay for jobs and services, and that’s exactly what Freelancer is. What motivated me to get started and keep going with Freelancer are the opportunities behind connecting millions of entrepreneurs and professionals from across the world.” -Matt Barrie

As of December 2019, Barrie continues to serve as a board member and CEO of Freelancer Technology.

Freelancer Technology raised money from three investors

As of December 2019, Freelancer Technology has raised a total of $37.5 million in funding over four rounds from three major investors.

Freelancer Technology raised $2.5 million in the first round. Freelancer Technology first received funding on May 1, 2009, in the form of a convertible note, which is a form of short-term debt that converts into equity, typically in conjunction with a future financing round. According to Crunchbase, Freelancer Technology raised $2.5 million from one investor, Startive Ventures.

Freelancer Technology raised $15 million in the second round. According to Crunchbase, Freelancer Technology had a pre-money valuation of $200 million. On November 15, 2013, Freelancer Technology raised $15 million through venture capital funding from Tempus Partners. 

Freelancer Technology raised $10 million in the third round. Freelancer Technology went public as of November 2013. On April 27, 2015, Freelancer Technology raised $10 million in its third round of funding through post-IPO equity, a type of funding round which takes place when a firm invests in a company after it has already gone public. Freelancer Technology received post-IPO equity funding from the investment firm Investible and partner Trevor Folsom.

Freelancer Technology raised another $10 million in the fourth round. On August 5, 2015, Freelancer Technology raised another $10 million in its fourth round through post-IPO equity funding. Crunchbase doesn’t list a new investor for the fourth round and lists Startive Ventures, Tempus Partners, and Investible as the only three investors of Freelancer Technology.

Freelancer Technology acquired 11 organizations in one decade

According to Crunchbase, Freelancer Technology acquired 11 organizations from less than ten years. The following timeline uses acquirees and announcement dates taken from the Freelancer Technology Crunchbase profile.

• July 19, 2010: Freemarket.com is acquired for an undisclosed amount
• December 20, 2010: LimeExchange.com is acquired for an undisclosed amount
• July 9, 2012: Scriptlance is acquired for an undisclosed amount
• November 19, 2012: Sadaqat Hussain is acquired for an undisclosed amount
• March 19, 2014: Zlecenia.przez.net is acquired for an undisclosed amount
• April 15, 2014: Warrior Forum is acquired for an undisclosed amount
• April 27, 2015: Escrow.com is acquired for $7.5 million
• December 13, 2016: Prolancer and Nubelo are acquired for an undisclosed amount
• November 21, 2018: Channel 40 is acquired for an undisclosed amount

Websites acquired by Freelancer.com. The about section of Freelancer.com features a list of several outsourcing marketplaces acquired by the site. Freelancer.com claims to have acquired:

• GetAFreelancer.com and EUFreelance.com founded by Magnus Tibell in 2004,
• Freelancer.de Booking Center in Germany,
• Freelancer.co.uk,
• Webmaster-talk.com,
• Rent-A-Coder, and
• vWorker founded by Ian Ippolito.

Websites and services offered by Freelancer Technology

Freelancer.com is the official website of Freelancer Technology

Freelancer.com is the world's largest freelancing and crowdsourcing marketplace by the number of users and projects. As of December 2019, Freelancer.com claims to connect “over 40,362,661 employers and freelancers globally from over 247 countries, regions, and territories.”

Services provided by Freelancer.com. Freelancer.com connects users to freelancers in over 1,350 different categories, including article writing, data entry, website design, graphic design, mobile apps, logo design, SEO, 3D modeling, copywriting, accounting, finance, manufacturing, logistics, and legal.

The six most popular projects on Freelancer.com are website development, graphic design, logo design, marketing, mobile app, and writing. The writing services available through Freelancer include article writing, copywriting, ghostwriting, SEO writing, technical writing, and other forms of content writing.

Controversies with Freelancer Technology

Privacy breach fine from the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner

In December 2015, the Office of the Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC) found Freelancer at fault for breaching the Privacy Act by violating the privacy rights of a former user. According to an article on The Register, “the argument about IP address protection for fraud protection came about because the complainant and Freelancer.com were in dispute about the use of anonymous accounts.” The complainant freely criticized Freelancer.com on his personal blog, the company's Facebook account, and on Wikipedia. 

The majority of the criticism concerned the collection of IP addresses by Freelancer.com. The Freelancer staff was aware of the complaint and the complainant's concerns. Freelancer staff members turned to Wikipedia and revealed personal information about the complainant. According to the article from The Register, a Freelancer staffer posted the following text on a third-party blog:

“Yes [complainant’s pseudonym] aka [pseudonym] aka [pseudonym] aka [real name – first name and surname initial]. We are well aware of your grievances and your racist comments on your [blog site name] blog. You are well aware of the reasons your particular account was closed.”

Commissioner Timothy Pilgrim of the OAIC found the disclosure of the complainant’s personal information on Wikipedia and the comments made on the third-party blog as breaches to the National Privacy Principle.

The Register provided the following quote from Commissioner Pilgrim's decision about the privacy breach:

“Freelancer’s conduct in improperly disclosing the complainant’s personal information was in my view aggravated by its apparent lack of disregard for the complainant’s privacy and its own privacy obligations. Freelancer continued to publish the complainant’s information online despite being made aware by the complainant that such action breached privacy legislation and was contrary to Freelancer’s own privacy policy.

From the complainant’s own evidence, it is clear that the manner in which Freelancer conducted itself highlighted Freelancer’s apparent contempt of, or at best, indifference to, the complainant’s complaints about its interference with his privacy. I am of the view that this conduct could be described as malicious, oppressive and/or high-handed.” - Commisioner Pilgrim

The outcome of the privacy breach. The OAIC awarded the complainant $20,000 AUD ($15,000 for non-economic losses and $5000 in aggravated damages) in damages because Freelancer employees publicly exposed the individual's private information, IP addresses, pseudonyms, and other details after the individual wrote several critical comments and personal blog posts about the company. Additionally, Commissioner Pilgrim ordered Freelancer.com to provide a written apology to the complainant and train its staff members to reflect the updates in its privacy policies within six months.

According to an article published by The Sydney Morning Herald in January 2016, Freelancer contested the $20,000 privacy breach fine from the OAIC. According to the article, Chris Koch, the deputy CFO, told The Australian Financial Review, Freelancer disagreed with some of the information being presented as fact and outlined plans to contest the fine.

“Freelancer disagrees with the outcome of this determination and in particular some of the facts that have been accepted as part of it. We are in the process of exercising our rights to appeal. As this matter is currently before the courts, it would not be appropriate to comment further at this time.” - Chris Koch, CFO of Freelancer.com

Another privacy complaint is filed against Freelancer.com

On March 15, 2018, Privacy.com reported, a “European account holder filed a $60,000 complaint against Freelancer.com with the Office of Australian Information Commissioner (OAIC).” The user alleged Freelancer.com had breached the Privacy Act and Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorism Financing Act because “requesting personally identifiable information after the service was provided instead of before, and for allowing the account holder to continue providing a service using an unidentified account.”

The report from Privacy.com speculated the complaint would not prosper based on the previous lawsuit filed by another European user where the OAIC’s decision was overturned to favor Freelancer.com.