BENGALURU: After receiving an annual payment of Rs 71.02 crore in FY22, IT services company Infosys CEO Salil Parekh's compensation fell 21% to Rs 56.44 crore in FY23 as he exercised fewer RSUs (Restricted Stock Units) compared to last fiscal.
Parekh's compensation was 627 times that of an average salary of an Infosys employee- Rs 9 lakh.
In its annual report, Infosys said of the total amount, Parekh's remuneration includes Rs 30.60 crore pertaining to the exercise of 1,24,783 RSUs under the 2015 Plan and 73,962 RSUs under the 2019 Plan during fiscal 2023.
Parekh's Rs 56.44 crore remuneration includes fixed pay, variable pay, retiral benefits and the perquisite value of stock incentives exercised during the period.
According to the annual report, the median Infosys salary was Rs 9,00,012 and Rs 8,14,332 in fiscal 2023 and 2022, respectively. The increase in the median remuneration of employees in FY23 compared to the previous fiscal was 10.52%.
The average annual increase in the salaries of employees was 9.9% in India, after accounting for promotions and other event-based compensation revisions, Infosys said. Last fiscal, Parekh's compensation was 872 times the median remuneration of employees.
Parekh's remuneration is lower compared to Wipro CEO Thierry Delaporte who took home about Rs 82.4 crore in FY23.
Infosys president Mohit Joshi was the highest paid as he earned Rs 57.32 crore in FY23. He will be joining Tech Mahindra as CEO and leaves Infosys on June 9. He is on leave from March 11, 2023, and will stay on leave till the last date with the Company, that is, June 9, 2023, said Infosys.
In his message, Nandan M Nilekani, chairman of, Infosys said, the cocktail of inflation, interest rates, geopolitics, war, demand volatility, supply chain dislocations, and the shift from efficiency to resilience and security, all stirring quickly and without warning, is what’s before us.
"In any week, we may oscillate from caution to optimism and back to caution based on the news of the day," he said.
Talking about AI, Nilekani said the problems of AI hallucination, systemic biases, and lack of explainability along with plenty of practical, ethical and intellectual property-related issues remain open and up for debate.
Infosys recruited over 50,000 college graduates in FY23 and ended the year with over 3,40,000 employees. At the end of the year, 39% of the company's employees were women.
In his letter to shareholders, Parekh said, "In the past few quarters, we have seen the global economy dealing with inflation, interest rate increases, and changes in the demand environment for companies in various industries. Our strength in digital, cloud, and in automation, along with cost-efficiency capabilities have held us in good stead. These will continue to be critical in the evolving economic environment."