BENGALURU: Backed by large deal wins, India’s second largest IT exporter Infosys on Tuesday reported better-than-expected numbers for the second quarter ended September 30, 2018. The IT bellwether’s profit stood at Rs 4,110 crore, registering a growth of 10.3 per cent compared to the same period last year.
The revenue of the company witnessed a growth of 17.3 per cent for the three-month period from July to September, as against the corresponding quarter last year and stood at Rs 20,609 crore.
During the quarter, the company’s large deal wins crossed $2 billion. The operating margins for the period was at 23.7 per cent, which is at the higher end of the guidance the company had predicted for the full year. Infosys, which said it has a better growth visibility going forward for the near-term, however, retained the margin guidance. “We are comfortable with the current range and we expect to meet this,” said Infosys CFO M D Ranganath.
For the full year ending March 2019, Infosys had given a revenue guidance in constant currency at 6-8 per cent, while the operating margin guidance is to be in the 22-24 per cent range. During the second quarter, the digital revenue stood at $905 million, which is about 31 per cent of the company’s total revenue, registering about 33.5 per cent YoY growth.
“Large deal wins at over $2 billion during the quarter demonstrate our increased client relevance and also give us better growth visibility for the near-term,” said Infosys MD & CEO Salil Parekh.
“In terms of large deals, these are lumpy deals and difficult to have that same target each quarter. It may fluctuate from quarter to quarter. Our demand pipeline is strong. In the current environment, we expect good deal wins,” he added.
Infosys rival and India’s largest IT exporter Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) had last week announced a strong profit growth of 22.7 per cent at Rs 7,901 crore and a revenue growth of 20.7 per cent at Rs 36,854 crore. Wipro, the third largest software exporter, is slated to announce its results next week.
Infosys on Tuesday also said that it will make necessary payments towards severance to its former chief financial officer Rajiv Bansal. On September 17, an arbitral tribunal had communicated to pay an amount of Rs 12.17 crore as severance to Bansal.
The company said it has received legal advice and will comply with the award.During the September quarter, the company made a net addition of 7,834 people, taking the total headcount to 2,17,739, while the consolidated annualised attrition stood at 22.2 per cent.
“On the employee cost part, some part of the spending has been to address issues related to attrition. When we say for controlling attrition, it is not a straight forward thing. Attrition has come down marginally, it is a reflection of the demand we are seeing in the market,” said U B Pravin Rao, COO.