Showing posts with label HCL. Show all posts
Showing posts with label HCL. Show all posts

Tuesday, September 29, 2009

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HCL to hire 2,000 software engineers to serve new customers

India’s fourth-largest software exporter HCL Technologies plans to hire 2,000 software engineers in the next three-four months to leverage new client base and existing operations across verticals, said a top company executive.

While 30% of the new hires would be freshers, the remaining 70% will comprise experienced professionals. This will take the company’s total workforce to more than 57,000 globally.

The software major struck various IT outsourcing services deal in the past few months, which has led to an increase in demand for workforce. Till last year, the company was high on campus hiring and took 15,000 freshers and professionals on rolls.

However, the firm intends to go slow on campus hiring this year owing to overall slowdown in demand for IT services world-wide.

“We are following just-in-time model of hiring. Unlike earlier when we used to give hiring guidance 18 months in advance, it will be a quarter or two in advance, as we are yet to have a clear visibility on where the industry is heading. Focus will be on lateral hiring for core IT processes across sectors,” said HCL Technologies global head (human resources) Dilip Kumar Srivastava.

He said the company has no plans to alter the compensation package of the freshers and that variable component of the salary will solely be performance based. Early this year, the company had put a freeze on employee salaries and resorted to bonus cutbacks, citing tight demand and declining volumes in the US and Europe as the rationale.

HCL has added a couple of new clients in the past few months. The firm bagged two IT outsourcing services contracts worth $110 million from Texas-based energy companies, Energy Future Holdings and Oncor.

To support the growing business, the company will also scale up headcount in Texas over the next few months.
The company currently serves clients in sectors, such as aerospace, defence, financial services, government, retail, lifesciences and telecom.

Friday, September 18, 2009

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Infosys, Wipro and HCL in race for low-value US deals

Infosys Technologies, Wipro and HCL Technologies are among the software service providers that are laying foundation for the next round of multi-million dollar orders from the big US corporations, by pitching for low-value, but politically important US state governments’ orders.

Infosys, which counts JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley as clients for its services, bids for Arizona Public Service’s (APS) 400 positions, who work in its information-services department, and another 400 or so contractors to raise the staff strength for undisclosed amount.

Nine other US states, some from where politicians opposed offshoring work, are looking to outsource their healthcare operations worth over $2 billion, said Wipro chief strategy officer KR Lakshminarayana, and the company hopes to get a slice of these.

“The discussions are not about offshore outsourcing, but more about working with newer outsourcing vendors, who can deliver locally and keep the jobs here at lower rates,” said a senior executive at one of the Bangalore-based tech firms exploring this opportunity. Many US states such as Missouri, Virginia and Arizona, which are battling falling revenues amid the worst economic slump in their country since the 1930s, are attempting to reduce costs and at the same time want to increase employment opportunities for their citizens. So, they are including clauses such as recruitment of minimum number of staff from their states.

Indian companies, which were used to contracts of hundreds of million-dollars at one go, are bidding for these low-value orders since their traditional clients are cutting down on technology spending and at the same time provides visibility, which would be helpful in getting big orders when tech spending recovers.

“The marketing muscle that comes from such contracts is huge and working with the US state governments send out a signal of importance to other customers,” said Siddharth Pai, managing director of outsourcing advisory firm TPI’s India unit. “For the Indian IT companies this is not a core business, but it creates a halo effect,” he added.

While the global government IT outsourcing market is estimated to be around $100 billion, experts tracking the sector said the US state governments could outsource projects worth up to $5-6 billion this year. States, which in the past opposed the outsourcing of work to Indian companies by the likes of Microsoft and Citigroup, are now turning to the same Indian companies, as their mission now is in line with that of the companies cut costs.


Rodney Nelsestuen of US-based research firm TowerGroup, said state governments in the US are suffering from a reduction in tax revenue due to high unemployment and lower spending on taxable items by the US consumers. “Significant budget cuts are making it difficult for states to maintain the level of services that residents expect. Outsourcing has become an option that governments are looking at,” he added.

The orders from these state governments are for maintenance of records, accounts, healthcare and other administrative jobs, said a consulting firm engaged with a few governments.

Indian companies are not worried about the fact that they may be at a disadvantage to their US peers such as IBM and Hewlett-Packard, which are more familiar with the functioning of the local governments. “As long as you have the competency and ability to deliver what they want and from where they want, you are as competitive as your local peer,” said Wipro’s Mr Lakshminarayana. Wipro already has a $407-million deal from the state of Missouri for application, maintenance and development (AMD) and BPO work for the state’s healthcare division, which it bagged in December 2007.

“They always ask us how many local jobs will we create and that sometimes is an important factor,” he added. TCS, Wipro, Infosys and Cognizant are among a few vendors, who have already hired local citizens. TCS has hired 120 people for its centre in Cincinnati.

“The level of success that India-based outsourcers will have in the future rests on their ability to add local talent, their ability to be viewed as global service companies and not just India-centric, and how quickly they assimilate government requirements – something India-based companies should be good at given their outsourcing history on a global and multi-industry scale,” said Mr Nelsestuen.

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

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Infosys ahead of the rest of the world, says Sonia

Software major Infosys is a "stunning reminder" of what Indian talent, ingenuity and hard work can accomplish, UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi said today.

"You have shown to India and the world that an Indian company Cannot just be world class, but be ahead of the rest of the world", the Congress President said after inaugurating the company's Global Education Centre-II here.

She said the success of Infosys, India's second largest software exporter, should not be measured in Dollars alone, but in the difference it makes in transforming a society for the better.

Praising the Indian IT industry, Gandhi said the success of Infosys, Wipro, Tata Consultancy Services and other companies had changed the lives of millions of Indians and propelled the country's economy to a record-breaking growth.

Gandhi also spoke of the enabling environment created by the state government for the growth of Indian IT companies.

She recalled the "temples of modern India" established by former Prime Minister Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru and the groundwork laid down by her husband Rajiv Gandhi for the "revolution" in Communication and Information Technology.

Rajiv Gandhi faced "bitter political opposition" to his vision, not just in introduction of computers, but his greater challenge was on the "mindshift" of people in terms of accepting new ideas, she said.

Monday, September 14, 2009

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A Dream Run for HCL

Topping the employee satisfaction charts is a feat which needs to be applauded
It was a time when most of the big players including TCS and Wipro preferred to stay away from the survey, but HCL Infosystems beat all expectations. Not only did it seem like smooth sailing but the company also managed to jump two ranks to get to the #1 spot.


Whether it came to managing peoples expectations, bridging the gap between top management and employees, or continuing to encourage leadership, HCLI didnt make too many mistakes. Perhaps it just kept doing things with a difference, and succeedeing too. While HR seemed to be pleased with its own performance (as it jumped a good seven points), the employees score (where it topped the list) too indicated that they were satisfied.

For years, HCLI has been the only hardware company in the BES Top10 club, and this year too it lived up to its imagecontinuing to be the #1 dream company. Last fiscal was particularly significant when HCLI divided its business into two broad categoriesB2B and B2C. This obviously was a fallout of the companys push on its SI business. As a result of this, overall business also did not suffer as harshly as it did for a lot of others.

In sync with the changing business goals, HCLI increased its HR strength, with a greater focus on peoples core competency, and understanding of the needs of the business. Also, a good chunk of the funds were allocated for training and education. A four dimension framework was developed to encourage leadership, technical knowledge, and sales. There was also a greater emphasis on e-learning.

On the salary front, the company claims there was a status quo. But one has to believe that the hikes continued as the company topped the charts there too. While everything else fits well with HCLIs dream run this year, there is one issue the company might want to spend some time on: the gender issue, with women constituting just about 7% of the total workforce. Which the company claims will improve with its increased SI focus.

Courtesy: DataQuest








Monday, August 31, 2009

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Wipro, HCL engineers commit suicide

In the last one week two young IT engineers, one was working with Wipro and another with HCL, committed suicide. Both the engineers died by jumping from their office building.

Wipro engineer, Vishal Yadav (29), had a BE in electronics and hailed from Madhya Pradesh. Since May 17, 2004, he was working with Wipro as a Business Analyst and had gone on leave for two months. Interestingly, he had put in his papers via e-mail and was supposed to be relieved of his duties on August 31.

At around 10:20 pm on Wednesday, Vishal jumped from the top floor of S-II building of Wipro that has 12 storeys. When security supervisors heard a loud thud, they rushed to the spot and found Vishal down with blood around his body. They took him to the hospital, but it was in vain as doctor declared him brought dead. Doctor said, "With multiple head, spinal and thigh fractures, he might have collapsed within minutes after the fall."

HCL (Hindustan Computers Limited) engineer, Vikas Kumar Sharma (26), hailed from Munger district in Bihar. Since January 01, 2009, he was working with HCL as a Senior Network Analyst. He was living with a cousin in Delhi's Katwaria Sarai area. Though he was on a official off on Wednesday (August 19), he decided to report for the duty. The company cab had brought Vikas to the office around 4.30 am. Around 5.50 am Vikas jumped from the 5th floor of the office building. He was rushed to a hospital where doctors declared him brought dead.

In both the cases, Police have been trying to find the reason of the death as they could not find any suicide note or any threat related information till now. In the case of Vishal, police framed eight questions and sent them to the human resources department of Wipro, but even after 24 hours, they were unable to get any personal details of the dead man. However, an HR executive of Wipro said, "We have been directed not to reveal any information or photograph of the employee. It is just that he had quit the job and was serving the notice period."

A police officer said, "We are not ruling out murder. There are lots of unanswered questions and it is for Wipro to clear the doubts."

In the case of Vikas, Noida's Superintendent of Police (City) Ashok Tripathi said, "The company's officials did not inform the police about the incident. Authorities at Max Hospital, where the victim was taken to, informed us."

In 2009, two suicide news of big IT companies' employees came in limelight. There are many engineers who are being harassed and forced to resign from the company. Last week, one of the former Wipro employees had informed media of the way he was sacked from the company.

Friday, August 28, 2009

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Indian outsourcing majors in talks for $1 billion Exxon deal: report

ExxonMobil is in talks with Indian technology firms including L&T Infotech and HCL Technologies Ltd. and multinational vendors to outsource IT contracts worth up to $1 billion, the Economic Times reported on its Web site Friday, citing a U.S.-based person familiar with ExxonMobil's outsourcing strategy.

"The discussions are at an early stage. However, ExxonMobil wants to work with fewer, large and medium-sized vendors at lower rates," the Web site quoted the person, who spoke on condition of anonymity, as saying.

Thursday, August 27, 2009

HCL Tech in pact with New Zealand's Optimation

Industrialist Shiv Nadar-promoted HCL Technologies Wednesday announced a pact with Optimation, a top company in information and communication technology in New Zealand, to offer services to the government there.

The pact calls for the two companies to draw on each other's strengths to also offer solutions to clients in optimising their business processes.

According to Virender Aggarwal, the head for HCL's Asia Pacific operations, the pact will result in significant number of local talent, expansion of training facilities in New Zealand and the setting up of a competency centre planned in Auckland.

"By providing the training infrastructure, we are directly addressing the wider industry skills shortage and investing in the future of our business," he added

The financial details, however, were not specified.

"HCL's willingness to engage on a fixed outcomes basis and to share risk is in tune with our own business philosophy," said Optimation's chief executive officer, Rhoda Holmes.

"In the current economic climate, we expect this approach to have broad appeal for New Zealand businesses looking to reduce costs and to get more business value out of their existing IT investments."

Wednesday, August 19, 2009

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Bankruptcy not to affect outsourcing deal: HCL Tech

New-Delhi based IT services provider, HCL Technologies — which signed a $350 million (around Rs 1,700 crore) seven-year IT operations and management deal with Reader’s Digest Association (RDA) in March this year — says RDA’s filing for bankruptcy, under Chapter 11 of the US Bankruptcy Code, will not affect the deal.

“It is business as usual and it (HCL Tech) continues to support RDA and does not see any impact on itself as of now,” the IT firm said in a Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) filing today. The Chapter 11 filing will apply only to RDA’s US businesses. Its operations in Canada, Latin America, Europe, Africa, Asia and Australia-New Zealand will not be hit.

“HCL is at the very core of our global operations, and we value the relationship today and going forward. Our underlying business operations are strong, and we are undertaking this initiative with the banks so we can significantly cut our debt and free cash for use in building our business. Our creditors are supportive and are working to ensure a smooth process with no disruptions to business operations,” said Albert Perruzza, senior vice-president (IT), Global Operations and Business Redesign for RDA, in a statement.

“At this point of time, the nature of the bankruptcy is unknown. We don’t know to what extent the restructuring will happen. It could be segmentation or realigning the existing business for RDA. So, there might not be an immediate impact on HCL Tech,” said Sabyasachi Satapathy, Partner at Tholons Advisory. Analysts tracking the stock markets corroborated that bankruptcy doesn’t mean that the entire business is lost and that many parts of the business are insured. “So, it is difficult to comment on the loss of business for HCL,” said an analyst.

Monday, August 17, 2009

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Fake Mailers Target HCL Job Aspirants

After the recent fraudulent recruitment mailers offering jobs at Wipro Technologies through a job portal, similar mails are being sent to job-seekers promising to send interview calls from HCL Technologies against refundable deposits.

The mail carries "HCL Direct Recruitments Offer" in the subject line and mentions openings in the company s upcoming projects in Pune and Delhi in the IT and electronics manufacturing segment.

The email reads: "The company has selected 32 candidates for IT, administration and production departments, as well as is offering you to join as an executive/manager post in respective department."

The email asks interested employees to make initial cash deposit Rs. 5,250 in favor of the HRD Department through any branch of Punjab National Bank to the company's Senior HRD. After doing so, the individual will receive an offer letter with air tickets for the final interview at HCL headquarters in Noida on Aug. 24.

Meanwhile, HCL has vehemently refuted these mails saying it strongly condemns such mails which are aimed at cheating innocent job aspirants, misleading them into giving money with the promise of providing jobs.

Ravi Shankar B, senior vice president and HR head-India operations, HCL, said, "Such activities also tarnish the company's image, even though the organization has no role to play in the crime". He added HCL has taken the matter seriously and is working with the police authorities to curb such malpractices.

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

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HCL bags order worth over Rs 40 crore from SBI

IT firm HCL Infosystems today said it has bagged an order of over Rs 40 crore from public sector bank State Bank of India (SBI) and associated banks to deploy, maintain and service their ATMs.

As per the agreement, HCL will deploy over 1,000 ATMs and cash dispensers with enhanced features such as Braille and support for multi-lingual content, HCL Infosystems said in a statement.

"We have been focusing on providing innovative banking and finance solutions for the Indian market...Given the potential of this sector, we are sure that with our ATM solutions we will be able to raise the bar for the banking and financial solutions in India," HCL Infosystems Chief Operating Officer J V Ramamurthy said.

Going ahead, HCL also plans to introduce rural ATMs, meant for deployment by banks in locations with relatively low transaction volumes and also help in the Financial Inclusion initiatives of banks, it said.

Tuesday, August 4, 2009

HCL acquires data centre in Parsippany

IT services firm HCL Technologies on Monday announced that it has completed the acquisition of a data centre in Parsippany, New Jerseyand will invest $15 million in the facility. The acquisition will help HCL increase its global footprint and meet growing customer demand for end-to-end services, including near-shore solutions and services and cloud computing, the Indian IT firm said in a statement.

HCL took over the data centre from a Fortune 500 company in October, 2008 and then upgraded the technology and service landscape. The IT firm is further upgrading the facility to a next-generation data centre by deploying best-of-breed, eco-friendly technologies from leading vendors and acquiring certifications. The company plans to hire more than 100 local US workers for the data centre.

"We believe that our investment in local geographies and innovative solutions and services will provide significantly reduced costs and enhanced IT performance, including proximity benefits to US enterprises," said C Vijay Kumar, SVP - service delivery at HCL’s infrastructure services division. HCL selected New Jersey as the location of its new facility due to a highly skilled workforce and close proximity to its US- based customers in the New York City area, particularly those in the financial services, life sciences and pharmaceutical industries.

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

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HCL inks pact with china-based eBaoTech

IT services provider HCL Technologies has entered into a strategic alliance with the China-based eBaoTech Corporation, a provider of software and services for life and general insurance industry.

Under the agreement, HCL would work with eBaoTech to identify fitment of eBaoTech's products in select geographies, HCL said in a statement.

Moreover, the companies together expect to help insurance carriers and intermediaries adopt IT solutions that would allow them to gain better process efficiencies in a cost effective manner, it added.

"We look forward to working with HCL to create significant and tangible value for insurance industry to become much faster, better, most cost efficient, and more scalable," eBaoTech CEO Woody Mo said.

Premkumar S, Corporate Officer, (Global Business Sponsor - Financial Services) HCL Technologies, said, "We are very excited about our partnership with eBaoTech as part of our product partnerships portfolio and see a lot of potential across major focus markets. As one of the leading end-to-end specialist insurance solution providers in the industry, HCL is equipped to fulfill the industry requirements by combining with eBaoTech's insurance system software capabilities."
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HCL Infosytems takes up project to disperse NREGA wages in UP

HCL Infosystems on Monday said it has undertaken a project with the Uttar Pradesh government to facilitate disbursement of wages to workers under National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) project.

As per the project, HCL Infosystems would implement technology for issuing e-job cards to workers in Sitapur district of UP.

"We are sure that using technology will further facilitate on-ground implementation of NREGA and the benefits of this initiative will reach the right individuals and thereby multiply its impact on the society," HCL Infosystems Executive vice-president George Paul said in a release.

As part of the phase one of the project, 1,000 e-job cards would be issued, it said.

Monday, July 27, 2009

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Global IT contracts dip 22% in First Half

Even in a recession-hit market where clients are cutting outsourcing budgets, Indian firms such as TCS, Infy, Wipro, HCL and Tata Communications have won large outsourcing deals this year placing them among the top 10 global service providers — on contract value terms.

Even though the total contract value of awarded outsourcing deals fell by 22% to $40.2 billion in the first six months of this year, Indian tech firms continued to compete neck and neck with the global biggies such as IBM, Accenture, HP/EDS, CSC, shows data from TPI. TPI is the largest sourcing data and advisory firm and measures commercial outsourcing contracts valued at $25 million or more.

Indian firms dominated the information technology outsourcing (ITO) segment ($33.2 billion) split into application, development & maintenance (ADM) and infrastructure segments.

Among the desi firms, the top deal winners were Cognizant, Infosys, HCL, TCS and Wipro featuring in the ADM section. HCL and Wipro were again listed among the top 10 infrastructure deal winners, TPI said. “Retail, diversified financials, transport, and network telecom services provided strength to the ITO market. TCS was the top vendor to win deals in three of these markets, while Infosys appeared as one of the top vendors in the Americas and the APAC region,” HSBC IT analyst Yogesh Aggarwal said.

Tata Com — only Indian firm among network service bigwigs such as AT&T, BT, Ericsson and Nokia Siemens — grabbed a place amongst top 10 club in a segment where deals worth $13.4 billion were awarded till June.

While the broader BPO market remained weak, experts believe Indian vendors relied on client mining, rather than winning new mega-accounts. Infy, that employs 16,700 people in its BPO division, was among the top 10 BPO service providers in the H1 of 2009, wherein globally contracts worth $7 billion were awarded to the likes of Capita, Perot Systems, Xerox, RR Donnelley and Johnson Controls.

Saturday, July 25, 2009

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HCL has taken over UCS Group's SAP biz

HCL Axon, a division of HCL Technologies, on Friday announced the takeover of the SAP practice of South Africa-based UCS Group. The transaction entails an all-cash consideration of $7.7 million and earn-out over the next two years.

The effective date of the transaction is August 1, 2009. The acquired practice offers tier-I retail and wholesale SAP project implementations. In a statement, HCL said the carve-out will deepen its SAP capabilities with best-in-class retail industry solutions (IS) and further increase its global delivery capabilities, including a boost to its presence in South Africa.

“We have a stated strategy to bring strong customer-focused vertical propositions and have identified the retail market as a major opportunity,” HCL Axon president Steve Cardell said.

The retail vertical is a key growth area for SAP and for HCL, the Indian IT firm’s enterprise application services head and corporate VP Ram Krishna said.

Thursday, July 23, 2009

HCL to Impart IT Skills to Delhi Students

Delhi University has entered into a tie-up with HCL Infosystems for imparting ICT training to its students. This initiative is aimed at creating a new generation of highly-skilled IT professionals who possess the industry perspective and practical understanding to become employable and productive.

HCL will offer six-month duration programs in Linux with Convergence Technologies Innovation (LCTI), Web Development Using PHP (WDPHP) and Web Designing (WD).

Despite the rapid mushrooming of IT institutes, industry-ready trained manpower is still in short supply. HCL courses have been designed to transform young students into industry-ready professionals, who are ready to take on ICT industry responsibilities without the need for any further training on the job, said George Paul, EVP, HCL Infosystems.

HCL has set up alliances with leading IT corporations such as IBM, Microsoft, Red Hat and Oracle in order to help in creating the curriculum as well as adopting global best practices in IT.

These courses, which we will offer, are designed keeping in view the fast-changing ICT industry manpower requirements due to emerging migration to Open Source technologies and unprecedented growth of Internet, said Paul.

Monday, July 6, 2009

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HCL BPO to offer remote technical support globally

HCL BPO, the business process outsourcing arm (BPO) of HCL Technologies, the New-Delhi based information technology services provider, shortly plans to offer remote technical support services to the global small office-home office (Soho) market, whose current size is estimated anywhere between Rs 960 crore and Rs 1,440 crore.

“The one-time solutions include virus and spyware removal, printer/scanner support, software installation and support, wireless support, internet connectivity issues, automated data backup, among others,” Gautam Saha, Head-Technical Support Services, HCL BPO, told Business Standard. The company will provide, according to Saha, both one-time incident based and subscription-based services. The monthly subscription would be around Rs 1,000 a month and around Rs 10,000 annually.

Technical support services (TSS) contributes around 31 per cent to HCL BPO’s revenues and is expected to grow by 50 per cent in two years, with these additional, platform-based, remote service offerings. There are more than 3,500 employees working in this division.

To provide remote technical support to homes in the US and Europe, HCL BPO is in talks with four broadband service providers in the US, and two in Europe, for white labelling (offering clients a branded service) HCL Virtual CIO services, to provide a single-stop shop for all IT-related products in a home/Soho environment.

For smartphone troubleshooting, for instance, it is in talks with three US-based telecom firms and two UK-based firms for whitelabelling this service. It is also in the final stages of talks with a US-based tool company to enable remote control of smartphones. The company is also tying up with big retail chains in the US to launch HCL service cards. through which these services can be taken to the consumer segment.

However, these services will be launched for the US and European markets first, said Saha, and would be gradually taken to the Indian market.

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

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HCL bags 5-yr deal from US beverages company

HCL Technologies on Tuesday bagged a five-year IT applications support and infrastructure management deal from US-based beverages firm Dr Pepper Snapple Group (DPS). While the IT firm didn’t disclose the deal size, HCL America president Shami Khorana said the DPS deal marked the fourth largest outsourcing contract won by HCL in the US this year. The Indian IT firm had earlier bagged a $350-million contract from The Reader’s Digest Association, a $100-million deal from Xerox and recently, a deal with MTV Networks.

Apart from applications support and maintenance, HCL will provide services, such as end-user computing, integrated service desk, network management and managed print services to DPS. As part of the deal, the Texas-headquartered firm will also become HCL’s anchor service desk customer at its Raleigh delivery facility in the US.


HCL Technologies said it won the deal, while competing against top multinational IT firms, such as IBM, and no other Indian IT firm was in the fray. DPS is an existing client of HCL Tech. The $5.7-billion Dr Pepper Snapple Group produces and markets carbonated soft drinks, juices, ready-to-drink teas, mixers and other premium beverages across the US, Canada, Mexico and the Caribbean.

Its brands include Dr Pepper, Canada Dry, Schweppes and Hawaiian Punch. The consumer packaged goods and retail vertical contributes about 6.5-7% to HCL’s revenues. “This will be a large growth vertical for us going forward,” Mr Khorana said. Companies in the segment are not only looking to cut IT costs but also want to transform their IT infrastructure, he added.

Thursday, June 25, 2009

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Controversy: American tech grads are unemployable: HCL CEO

HCL technologies' Chief Executive Vineet Nayar recently said that American tech graduates are basically 'unemployable', according to an InformationWeek report. He says that he views American tech grads as inferior to those from India, China and Brazil. American tech students only enter the field to get rich or to dream up the next big thing while students from India and China are willing to handle even the boring part of the industry, ITIL and Six Sigma.

Several months ago few western CEO had claimed that even though India produces second largest number of engineers in the world, more than half of them are unemployable. They also say that Indian graduates are smart, driven and they work for a pittance compared to their Western counterparts but lack critical thinking and creativity and function like robots.

Nayar has responded back to such claims as he feels that Americans are too costly to train as compared to Indian graduates who are highly trained in real life applications because they attend vocational courses and have hands on experience. HCL, however, has recently announced that it plans to open a delivery centre in North Carolina with an investment of $3.2 million and will hire over 500 employees over the next five years under a U.S. Job Development Investment Grant.

These remarks from Nayar have already created quite a few controversies. InformationWeek's Robert Preston wrote: "Imagine if the CEO of a U.S.-based tech company marched into Mumbai seeking a bigger share of the country's multibillion dollar market and declared the locals to be unemployable and un-trainable. A culture of innovation isn't inconsistent with one that values attention to detail." Few websites have taken this to extreme. A protectionist web site JobDestruction.com has sent email newsletter which says, "HCL hires Indians almost exclusively, so it's safe to assume that Nayar's disparaging comments don't just apply to our young college graduates. He thinks ALL Americans are unemployable."

Friday, June 5, 2009

HCL to provide support services to Linde Group

HCL Technologies on Thursday announced that its German subsidiary has entered into a multi-year, multi-regional enterprise resource planning support services and projects engagement with gases and engineering firm The Linde Group. As per the engagement, HCL gets the prime vendor status for Linde’s support services and projects on the SAP enterprise software platform. The financial details were not disclosed.

“We are delighted that The Linde Group has decided to partner with HCL Technologies to deliver leading-edge SAP services in support of its ERP strategy. With the recent acquisition of Axon and the formation of the HCL AXON division, HCL Technologies significantly enhanced its ERP offering and this global agreement with The Linde Group is testament to the growing recognition of the value we bring our customers,” said HCL Axon president Steve Cardell.

HCL had acquired UK’s SAP consultancy Axon Group for £441 million ($658 million) last year. Axon was then reverse merged with HCL’s SAP practice to form HCL Axon.