Wipro eyes Nordic telecom biz

HELSINKI, FINLAND: India's number three software services exporter, Wipro Ltd., is aiming to secure a bigger slice of business from Nordic telecom operators when they outsource IT operations, a senior Wipro executive said.

The strengthening Indian rupee is set to hurt Wipro's profit margins, but the company is targeting a fast rise in sales, P. R. Chandrasekar, head of Wipro's European and American business, told Reuters in an interview.

Chandrasekar pointed to Nordic countries as one of the target growth areas for Wipro in Europe and listed telecom operators, the manufacturing sector and financial services as its main focus in the region.

Wipro and other Indian vendors started a larger push into the Nordic region last year to win business from telecom gear makers Nokia and Ericsson, cutting prices and denting profits of local IT services vendors.

"We are already there but we feel there is still room to grow. We are present on the engineering side, but there is more we can do on the telecom services provider side," Chandrasekar said on the sidelines of the European Business Leaders Convention.

Wipro's plans to put pressure on TietoEnator, the market leader in IT outsourcing for Nordic telcom operators, some of which have outsourced a major share of their IT operations.

Wipro has recently bought three European IT firms -- Austrian New Logic, Finnish Saraware and Portugal's Enabler -- with staff from 120 to 300, with the largest, Enabler, costing it 41 million euros ($55 million).

"We will continue to acquire small European companies. Maybe slightly bigger than so far," Chandrasekar said, adding that the company was targeting expertise and access to new markets.

On April 20, when reporting January-March results, Wipro said the rise of the Indian rupee was a concern for it.

During the April-June quarter, the Indian currency rose a further 6 percent against the U.S. dollar, with many expecting the rise to continue, powered by massive investment flows into India's fast-growing economy.

Chandrasekar said the company is increasing its hedging level and was seeking productivity improvements to offset the impact.

The change has been so rapid in the last couple of months that it is difficult to offset it ... it has clearly implications, primarily in terms of profitability," he said.

"Hopefully in the next quarter or two we can recover and keep our margins reasonably steady," he said.

Chandrasekar said the company expects rapid sales growth to continue was trying to match analysts' expectations of around 40 percent growth for the ongoing fiscal year.