Guest post: the return of India’s patriarchs
By Manjeet Kripalani of Gateway House
In his return to the chief’s chair to revive the premier Indian information technology giant Infosys Technologies which he co-founded, N Narayanamurthy is following a well-worked tradition in the corporate world. This return, however, has a new twist: Murthy will be accompanied into the executive suite by his 30-year old computer scientist son, Rohan. Continue reading »
Infosys: Murthy’s return boosts stock but raises doubts
Shares in Infosys, the Indian IT group, bounced up 5.5 per cent on Monday morning, after the weekend announcement that Narayana Murthy would take back the reins as executive chairman of the board for five years.
But the news is hardly a positive reflection on Indian business culture. Internal age restrictions have been rejigged to allow for the return of the company’s 66-year-old co-founder who is bringing his son in as an executive assistant. If Infosys, a group that prides itself on its professional management methods, behaves like this, then so will other Indian companies. Continue reading »
Wipro: another acquisition in the long swim upstream
As India’s IT sector looks to new markets for growth, the country’s fourth largest IT company, Wipro, has announced that it will pay $30m for a minority stake in the privately held Opera Solutions, a US organisation that works in predictive and prescriptive data analytics.
That translates into helping companies use data to manage costs, risks and other areas of the business. It’s a high-value element of the IT sector that many Indian companies are trying to expand into as growth in other services has tailed off. Continue reading »
India: home of the Braille smartphone
A quarter of the world’s 161m blind and severely visually impaired people live in India, according to Sightsavers, the international charity.
Combine that with the fact that India is buzzing with technology and entrepreneurship, and it makes sense that the world’s first Braille smartphone is being developed in the country. Continue reading »
Indian tablet makers take strides
Indian makers of tablet computers are elbowing their way into the domestic market, which is expected to expand rapidly in the next few years.
Although Samsung and Apple feature strongly in the Indian tablet market, figures from the International Data Corporation, an information technology research company, show India’s two leading domestic manufacturers have grabbed a market share of more than 20 per cent. Continue reading »
Wipro delivers solid results but adds to uncertain outlook for Indian IT
As India’s results season rolls on, Friday brings news from Wipro, which recently split its operations between information technology and non-IT businesses.
The results are generally positive – though India’s third largest IT company has disappointed markets with its forecasts for the current quarter. Continue reading »
India’s Tata Consultancy calms investors
After acquiring a small French company last week, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) says it is looking to make further acquisitions in Germany and Japan.
The plans were mentioned during a press conference after the Indian IT bellwether published its full-year earnings report, meeting expectations and confirming that the highly disappointing results posted by Infosys last week were not indicative of the state of India’s broader IT services sector. Continue reading »
TCS finds a tasty French deal
It may be only $97m. But it’s the biggest deal that India’s Tata Consultancy Services, has ever struck in mainland Europe.
TCS is buying French IT group Alti SA in the latest in a series of acquisitions by high-tech Indian companies seeking to break into Europe’s tough outsourcing market. The company’s chief executive told the Financial Times that it’s likely to be the first of a number of purchases as TCS looks to grow in areas including Germany and the Nordic region. Continue reading »
Mahindra Satyam buys into Brazil
India’s IT companies are increasingly looking to underpenetrated markets in search of growth. And bang on trend, Mahindra Satyam, the Indian IT and business consulting services company, has bought a 51 per cent stake in Brazil’s Complex IT. Continue reading »
India: there’s money in missed calls
A missed call from a friend is a coded request for you to ring back. From a daughter, a missed call could be an agreed signal that she is home safely. From a dabbawalla it means he’s arrived with your lunch.
This costless method of communication is used like a modern day Morse Code in India. And businesses are catching on – by some estimates, India’s missed call business is worth Rs5bn ($94m). Continue reading »
Davos 2013: Mahindra Satyam, ready for the next round of M&A
The sales are on this month in Europe – and Mahindra Satyam wants to go shopping.
Speaking to beyondbrics in Davos, CP Gurnani, CEO of the Indian IT giant, said his company would be actively looking for M&A opportunities in Germany and France this year. “I want to make an acquisition this year,” Gurnani said, “Germany and France are on my radar.” Continue reading »
India IT: good results, mixed response
Investors can be a fickle lot when it comes to Indian IT.
After results earlier in the week from Infosys and Tata Consultancy Services far exceeded expectations, Wipro’s strong profits growth wasn’t enough to stop the shares taking a beating. HCL though, had an easier ride.
Continue reading »
Tata follows Infosys lead
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), India’s leading IT services group, reported unexpectedly good profits for the quarter ended in December, confirming hopes that the good news from rival Infosys, which kicked off the earnings season on Friday, wasn’t just a one-off surprise. Even after rising 3.8 per cent on Friday on Infosys’s announcement, TCS was up a further 2.1 per cent on Monday. Continue reading »
India: technology institutes face fee increase…and quality concerns
What do Narayana Murthy, the co-founder of Infosys, Rajat Gupta, the disgraced former chief executive of McKinsey, and Arvind Kejriwal, leader of India’s Aam Aadmi Party, have in common?
They all graduated from the renowned Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs). But would these men have reached positions of power without an IIT education? And could they have enrolled if IIT’s tuition fees were significantly higher? Continue reading »
Tech Mahindra’s free rape alarm app
After the fatal assualt and gang-rape of a 23 year-old woman in Delhi last month, Tech Mahindra – a technology and consulting company in the Mahindra Group – has made free to the Indian public an application designed to “help make our streets safer for women”. Continue reading »
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