Monday, April 19, 2010

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Infosys IT Inc's biggest paymaster in 2009

Unveiling plans to hire 30,000 persons this fiscal, IT bellwether Infosys today said it has paid $134 million (nearly Rs 600 crore) in salaries in 2009-10-the highest amount in the IT industry's history in India in a year.

Infosys HR head T V Mohandas Pai said the company has already made 19,000 campus offers for fiscal 2011.

Talking to reporters, he also said Infosys envisages recruiting 1,000 personnel each for its China and US offices and around 400 in Manila, he said. The company plans to induct 5,500-6,500 laterals, he added.

"There has been a large wage increase for middle and junior level employees. At the senior level, there has been a 10 per cent increase in wages. Overall, the average wage hike has been around 14-17 per cent," he said.

Nearly 7,500 persons were promoted by Infosys during the past year, out of whom 2,500 had been impacted by the company's new employee restructuring programme, called I-Race.

As per the restructuring programme, which aimed at fitting employees into roles they were prepared for, nearly 4,500 employees had been fitted in a role lower than what they were earlier fitted into. 0ut of these 4,500 personnel, 2,500 have now been promoted and the remaining 2,000 might be promoted in October.
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Indian cos' hiring activity picks up 1.5 % in March

India Inc's hiring activity picked up 1.5 per cent in March, led by IT-enabled services, insurance and auto sectors, a report by job portal naukri.Com has said.

Job portal naukri.Com's monthly Job Speak survey reflected renewed optimism among recruiters, with the new job index moving up to 962 in March compared to 947 in February.

The portal takes into account not only the jobs posted online by its clients but also those made by them with the help of the website's tele-calling team.

"The hiring intentions of companies in most industry sectors seem to be moving in a positive direction as reflected by the consecutively upward moving Job index in the first quarter of 2010. It seems 'cautious optimism' among employers has given way to definite optimism," said Sumeet Singh, the National Head (Marketing and Communication) of Info Edge, which owns the website.

Hiring in ITeS and insurance sectors have seen maximum movement with the index moving up by 13 per cent and 15 per cent respectively in March over the last month.

Recruitment in auto sector moved up by 8 per cent and in pharma sector by 7 per cent in March, the report said.

Professionals in production, banking and HR also witnessed an increase in hiring by 8 to 12 per cent in March over February, the report said.

Overall, the index seems to be moving in a robust manner with hiring moving up across all industry verticals, functional areas and cities.

Among cities, Delhi have emerged as the most bullish on hiring, with the city-wise job index moving up 13 per cent over the last month.
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iGate to hire 500, eyes acquisitions

IT services company iGate said it will hire 500 professionals in the next two quarters to support its expanding operations.

"Most of the 500 people we plan to hire in over the next six months will be in India and some in Mexico and the US. They will be employed in both services in BPO areas," iGate CEO Phaneesh Murthy said.

The Nasdaq-listed company, which has been eyeing acquisitions in $30-70 million range for some time, is hopeful making it in 2010.

"We are aggressively pursuing it... We have $100 million cash on our balance sheet. We are eyeing acquisitions in $30-70 million range and we should finalise it in few months," he said. The company is looking at healthcare and financial BPO services.

There is a large pent-up demand... I think the bigger recovery is in the financial services," he said.

iGate said its net income more than doubled to $11.6 million for the January-March quarter compared to compared to $5 million registered in the same period last year, Murthy said.

Revenue was up 29 per cent at $57.9 million for the quarter ended March 31, 2010, compared to $44.8 million during the same period last year, he added.

iGate Chief Financial Officer Sujit Sircar said, "While we had an excellent performance in Q1 and expect revenues to grow, margins are likely to be under pressure due to increased hiring, rupee appreciation and wage inflation. Our cash and cash equivalents and short-term investments crossed the $100 million mark."

The company ended Q1 with 7,357 employees, a net addition of 447 employees during the quarter. Seven new customers were added by iGate during the quarter.

Monday, April 12, 2010

MphasiS to buy Fortify for $15m

MphasiS has signed a definitive deal to acquire 100 per cent stake in Fortify Infrastructure Services (FIS), a provider of offshore based Remote IT Operations and Management (ROM) Services, for $15.5 million in an all cash transaction.

With this acquisition, MphasiS – which is an IT solutions, services and BPO provider in application development, system integration, product implementation, consulting services – believes that it will be able to provide outcome based services that go beyond technical SLAs.

Ganesh Ayyar, CEO of MphasiS, said, “This acquisition will catapult us ahead as a provider of offshore-based ROM services. Mid market customers are looking for partners to solve the challenges of operating and managing their IT. We see this as our sweet spot to provide cost effective and outcome based ROM services.”

In a press release, MphasiS said that this acquisition will give it access to marquee customers, an experienced management team, a talent pool of highly specialised professionals and a proven platform to provide ROM services.

Rajkumar Velagapudi, CEO of Fortify Infrastructure Services, said, “Our proven industry track record in providing outcome-based ROM services, coupled with MphasiS’ rich expertise and leading offshore capability will provide mid market customers a flexible, high-value operations management platform that is focused on achieving their business objectives.”

FIS has presence in India and the US with 250 employees.

Tuesday, March 30, 2010

CSC under scanner for 'exploiting' Indian IT professionals in Denmark

The Indian subsidiary of the world’s fourth-largest IT services provider, the $16.7-billion Computer Science Corporation (CSC), is under scanner for allegedly exploiting Indian IT professionals sent onsite to Denmark.
Source: EconomicTimes

The accusation comes from a local IT workers’ union, which claims CSC is paying Indian IT professionals in Denmark salaries lower than the minimum stipulated by law.

PROSA — a Danish trade union for IT professionals — raised the issue last month when an Indian IT professional on deputation in Denmark, protested about not being paid the salary promised by CSC. The issue is creating headlines in the Nordic country, which has about 65,000 IT professionals.

According to papers filed by PROSA with Danish investigating authorities, CSC pays Indian IT professionals between 5,000 and 8,000 Danish Kroner (DKK) a month — roughly equal to what the Indian IT workers would get, working in Noida or Hyderabad. (One DKK is equal to Rs 8).

But Danish law states that foreigners must earn at least 31,250 DKK monthly to enter the country through the so-called salary amount rule, which is part of the Aliens Act. “Danish law requires companies to pay foreign IT workers in Denmark a minimum wage of 31,250 DKK, which is roughly equal to Rs 2.5 lakh per month, to enter the country. We believe more such IT companies are involved in exploiting Indian IT workers onsite,” said Hanne Lykke Jespersen, union secretary, PROSA. “The Danish government has already launched an investigation into this matter,” she added.

To give a comparison between the cost of living in Denmark and India, a McDonald’s Big Mac (called Maharaja Mac here) costs $1.5 (Rs 69) in New Delhi. The same Big Mac costs about $5.7 (Rs 250) in Copenhagen. In another comparison, per capita income in Denmark is about $3,000 per month. In contrast, Indian IT workers are often paid even lower, at about $1454 per month (equating with 8,000 DKK per month), going by PROSA’s claims.
Source: EconomicTimes
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TCS to hire 30,000 in next fiscal

IT major, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), today said that its growth momentum in the last quarter of this fiscal would be better than the previous quarter and that the entire IT industry would see an improvement in the deal pipeline.

"The growth is definitely there and we should stick to what we have said earlier...The growth momentum in the last two quarters will continue this quarter also but we have to see whether it will be better than those during the boom days," TCS Chief Financial Officer and Executive Director, S Mahalingam, told reporters on the sidelines of a CII-IFRS summit here.

On increments to its employees, Mahalingam said that the company would be announcing the same around April but he would not be able to divulge the quantum now.

The TCS official, however, said that it would definitely be as per industry standards and keeping in view the prevailing economic scenario.

Mahalingam said that the company has planned to hire 30,000 personnel in the next fiscal.