Tremendous demand for IT services: Azim Premji

BANGALORE, INDIA: With macro-economic factors stabilising globally and the mood improving, there is a lot of demand for IT services, Wipro chairman Azim Premji said on Friday.

"When I talk to business leaders globally, the overall mood appears to be improving. With focus on productivity, there is a lot of demand for IT services, if we are able to show value to the customer," Premji told reporters after his global software major reported better than expected results for third quarter (October-December) of this fiscal.

Noting that the overall macro-economic factors were stabilising globally, Premji said the US economy was showing improvement, as evident from growing consumer demand and improvement in employment data.

"In IT business, we are seeing increase in influence of customer budgets by CXO (chief executives) and our strategy is focused on selling to them in addition to CIOs (chief information officers)," Premji said.

Admitting that this fiscal (2012-13) had seen a temporary slow down across geos (geographies) and segments due to macro-economic conditions, the IT czar said as corporations leverage technology to drive revenue and productivity, his company would invest in aligning its go-to-market strategy growth in line with its revenue guidance.

"In our key growth markets like Brazil, we are poised for high growth trajectory, helped by the $66-billion economic stimulus and localisation effort underway in that developing country," he said.

Echoing the general view that the Indian economy had bottomed out, Premji, however, put the onus of revival on the government's fiscal and policy impetus for growth this year.

"Though we are positioned more strongly than ever as a global player and partner of choice, a lot will depend on how things would play out globally and locally for a turnaround in demand to fuel growth," Premji said.

Upbeat on sustaining growth, the company said its flagship global IT services business would grow in the range of $1,585-$1,625 million or sequentially 1.8 percent to $1.61 billion ($1,605 million) in fourth quarter (Jan-March) of this fiscal as per the International Financial Reporting Standard (IFRS).

In a regulatory filing earlier, the company said it posted net profit of Rs.1,716 crore (Rs.17.16 billion) for the quarter under review (Q3), registering 18 per cent year-on-year (YoY) and 6.5 per cent sequentially.