NEWS Interactive, the Internet arm of media group News Limited (www.news.com.au), will unveil its second big Internet business this month.

It will launch the job search site CareerOne into the cut-throat online recruitment market.

The site is due to be launched in three weeks, and will follow News Interactive's business-to-consumer auctions site goFish, which went live last Wednesday.

CareerOne will cater to university graduates, newcomers to the job market and "mid-careerists" seeking to push higher in their jobs.

News Interactive careers general manager David Stewart said the business would offer thousands of job listings, articles about target-group industries and professions and online chats with career experts.

The key source of revenue will be advertising from companies and recruitment agencies.

CareerOne will use content from News's national stable of newspapers, including The Australian. It will also draw from companies related to News, such as HarperCollins and Fox.

Analysts said CareerOne would face strong and immediate competition in a market occupied by more than 70 rival online recruitment services.

Among recognised leaders are independent players Seek (www.seek.com.au) and Jobnet (www.jobnet.com.au), as well as the John Fairfax Holdings sites, mycareer (www.mycareer.com.au) and ITJobs (www.itjobs.com.au).

"News Interactive has been known as a slow adapter in the Internet space, it will face a very hard contest," according to APT Strategies analysts. "Some rivals are recognised brands both online and in the print market."

Seek executive director Andrew Bassett said the entry of key print media players into online recruitment helped legitimise the market.

"We had nearly half a million visitor sessions last month, and our ad sales and job ads are growing at about 20 per cent a month, and that expansion is partly due to the massive growth of the market," he said.

"The extent that News and Fairfax are chasing this is significant. It just proves that the Internet is the place to be. It's good for us, but not good for their traditional print businesses."

The site will aim to cater to the needs of key professions and industries. It will also be backed by a call centre open between 8am and midnight, seven days a week.

APT Strategies is one of Australia's leading online research companies having conducted over 100 qualitative and quantitative research projects and over 150 Internet research and electronic commerce studies for leading Australian and international companies. In 1999, APT Strategies completed over 45,000 online interviews with Australian Internet users. The Australian Online Readership Survey has been endorsed by Australia's leading websites and is conducted half yearly. APT Strategies has offices in Sydney, Auckland and Singapore.