Like all IT services exporters, Wipro also felt the effect of rupee appreciation and the imminent US recession. But Wipros domestic business ensured that the slowdown did not hit it as bad as its Bangalore neighbor. While Infosys growth dropped from 45% to 19%, Wipros dropped from 40% to 27%.

What also helped Wipro was its much-publicized MEGA/GAMA strategy initiated a year earlier. Wipro started this initiative to identify growth potential within existing clients: a client having potential to give $100 mn annualized revenue was a MEGA account whereas one with potential to give $50 mn was a GAMA account. Wipro won multiple $50 mn plus contacts like the five-year contract with Saudi telecom major Etihad Atheeb.

In August, Wipro acquired infrastructure management company, Infocrossing in a $600 mn deal, Wipros biggest till date. The acquisition helped Wipro take up its infrastructure services revenue to 13%, up from 12% of IT exports (excluding BPO), even as it managed to bring down ADM revenue to 60% from 64% a year earlier. While systems integration and testing also grew well, BPO grew from 17% in FY 06 to 27% in FY 08.

Rank-2
l Start-up Year: 1981 l Products & Services: IT services, product engineering services, technology infrastructure services, consulting services l Employees: 68,944 l Address: Doddakannelli, Sarjapur Road, Bangalore-560035 l Fax: +91-080-28440258 l Website: www.wipro.com
Highlights n Azim Premji moved from a hands-on role giving management to two co-CEOs n Wipro finally managed to get into the total outsourcing space in the domestic market n Consolidated various consultancy practices in the company under one umbrella, Wipro Consulting Services Strengths p Infocrossing acquisition has given it first rate hosting capability in the US market p The portfolio of services is well-balanced Weaknesses q Restructuring and appointment of two joint-CEOs appears to have created confusion among customers q Slow on productizing or platforming		Suresh Vaswani, joint CEO Girish Paranjpe, joint CEO AL Rao, COO Pratik Kumar, executive VP, HR Suresh Senapaty, CFO Lakshminarayan, chief strategy officer Sudip Nandy, executive of the Telecom and Product Engineering Solutions Business Unit TK Kurian, head, Consulting Business Ashutosh Vaidya, head, Wipro BPO Zach Lonstein, CEO, Infocrossing

The big news was the domestic front. Last year saw a decisive shift with Wipro moving from being a technology integrator to a strategic IT outsourcing partner, with two total outsourcing deals including one with mobile operator Aircel. In the SMB segment, it emerged as the most prolific SAP integrator, winning more than one-third of SAPs new contracts (about 90).

Wipro saw organizational restructuring with Infotech and technology coming under one umbrella. Suresh Vaswani, the earlier head of Wipros India/Asia/ME business and Girish Paranjpe, head of BFSI were appointed as joint-CEOs. The other changes at the top included Sudip Nandys movement to head R&D, Sudeep Banerjees shift to PremjiInvest, a PE firm started by Azim Premji. Ashvtosh Vaidya, earlier head of PC business, became head of Wipro BPO. TK Kurien, the chief architect of the growth of Wipro BPO version 2, who transformed the acquired voice-heavy Spectramind business to a transaction BPO business, was moved to head consulting.

Page(s)   1