TCS plans to bid with CMC for Rs 5K cr UID projects

As India’s top tech firms prepare to bid for projects worth almost Rs 5,000 crore to set up the country’s unique citizen database, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) plans to bid jointly for this opportunity along with CMC, a government-focused subsidiary it acquired some eight years ago.

The world’s biggest citizen database being set up by the Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) will rely heavily on biometric and fingerprint information of the country’s 1.2 billion citizens, and would seek solution providers who can bring relevant expertise.

“Whether we bid as a consortium or not will largely depend on the conditions specified in the RFP (request for proposal). If they want a single point of contact, then CMC will act as a sub-contractor to TCS,” said CMC, CEO and MD R Ramanan.

On its part, TCS has been leveraging CMC’s relationships with different government agencies and departments in order to create a competitive government business, bigger than domestic rivals Wipro and Infosys. For instance, TCS worked together with CMC on winning the Rs 1,000 crore e-passport project awarded last year.

“For some of these projects, an existing capability and understanding brought by the age-old CMC helps them do better,” said a senior executive at one of the rival firms which had bid for the passport project.

“Training is one of the biggest bottlenecks in any government project-and this is where CMC proves an asset to TCS,” he added.

Experts such as Alok Shende, principal analyst of Ascentius Consulting say that CMC does provide TCS an edge over others.