Wipro bags Rs.11.8bn outsourcing deal

BANGALORE, INDIA: Wipro Infotech had bagged a Rs.11.82-billion (Rs.1,182-crore) IT outsourcing contract from the state-run Employees State Insurance Corp (ESIC), recently.

In bagging the deal, Wipro outbid India's other two IT bellwethers Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and Infosys Technologies in a global tender floated in November 2008 for ESIC's 'Project Panchdeep'.

The over six-year contract involved implementing a project to improve healthcare services to its beneficiaries by providing online facilities to employers and insured people for registration, payment of premium and disbursement of cash benefits.

ESIC, a statutory corporation under the ministry of labour and employment, is the implementing agency for the social security scheme in the country.

Other modules would provide human resources,finance and general administration programmes for increasing the corporation's efficiency.

The project was mandated by the ESI Act 1948, with a focus on creating a medicare backbone for the marginalised sections of society.

Anand Sankaran, vice-president, Wipro Infotech, said: 'It is an honour to be awarded one of the prestigious e-governance projects in the country. As a strategic relationship for us, we are committed to making it a showcase in the e-governance domain."

The five parts of the project had been termed as Pehchan, Milap, Pashan, Dhanwantri and Pragati.

The project included identification of 10 million subscribers and their family members covered under ESIC and connecting all its locations - the head office, 51 regional, sub-regional and divisional offices, 620 branches, 144 hospitals, 1,388 dispensaries and state directorates.

Source: India PR Wire