infosys

Innovative Conference on Embedded Systems, Mobile Communication and Computing,
August 11-14, 2008,
Infosys, Mysore, India

The ICEMC² 2008 is a premier conference which brings together professionals, academics, industry experts, students, enthusiasts to discuss various emerging trends, innovation, share research results and new directions in the field of Embedded systems, Mobile Communication and Computing. The Conference has evolved over a period of 5 years and is improving each year in quality of papers and talks being presented. The conference committee comprises of leading experts in the domains related to conference theme. The conference is organized in a systematic way and strictly follows the mature review processes and practices. Participants and organizers of ICEMC2 2008 take home information and experience that enrich them in their work, research, studies, teaching, professional activities.

Details of the topics for paper submission at ICEMC2 2008 are:

• Wireless Networks
• Applications and Services
• Systems, Mobile Cellular Systems Future development
• Multimedia/DSP
• Embedded Systems
• New Features and Innovation
• Computing Techniques
• Web 2.0

Schedule

Infosys BPO, the business process outsourcing subsidiary of Infosys Technologies, has announced that NelsonHall, a leading BPO analyst, has positioned the company’s Securities Processes Outsourcing operations in the Leaders Quadrant in its report, ‘Securities Processing BPO Assessment and Forecast’ released in May 2007. According to the report, Infosys leads the offshore vendors in the securities processing services market in 2006 with estimated revenues of $20 million.

NelsonHall defines securities processing as processes that support the ownership (including change of ownership) of investment instruments (excluding insurance, annuities, drafts, or bills of exchange). Securities processes include trade related services:

• Pre-trade services (industry usage: Front office): trade execution and capture
• Post-trade services (industry usage: Middle office): settlement, trade match
• Portfolio services (industry usage: Back office): custody, transfer agency, fund accounting

The ranking uses a two-dimensional matrix that evaluates vendors based on their ability to provide flexibility for asset managers to enter new areas competently and manage rapid growth with better intelligence.
"We believe that this ranking by NelsonHall is a key milestone that reinforces Infosys’ leadership in the Securities processing space. Infosys understands that the requirements of capital markets customers are different from banking customers and recognizes the need to address operational challenges like market-specific domain knowledge, smaller team sizes, fragmented processes and complexity of systems. Coupled with this is our ability to understand the various dimensions of risk and the need to put commensurate controls. Our customers have recognized this and we believe this analysis from NelsonHall once again demonstrates our differentiating strengths," said Ritesh Idnani, Vice President and Head of Worldwide Sales and Marketing and Banking and Capital Markets Unit Head.

According to Andy Efstathiou, Director, NelsonHall’s Banking Program, “Securities processing BPO vendors need to support clients’ portfolio and trading activities through improved process execution and improved business insight. The critical success factors for vendors are the ability to provide flexibility for asset managers to enter new areas competently and manage rapid growth with better intelligence.”

The global Securities Processing BPO market is growing rapidly based on new products, markets, customers and changing regulations. While the U.S. Securities Processing BPO market is expected to reach $34bn by 2011, the European market will continue to be propelled by cross-border market entry and the ROW is dominated by Asia in terms of amount and growth rates.

The company to have 23,000 employees in Pune from March
Come March and Pune will be the biggest center for Infosys Technologies.

Speaking to the media after announcing the second quarter financial results, T V Mohandas Pai, member of the Board and chief of Human Resources at Infosys, said that the company would be employing over 23,000 people at its center in Pune. Its Bangalore center will employ 22,000 people.

“We are expanding in various cities. For instance, we have taken 450-acre land in Hyderabad. Similarly we have land in Jaipur, Mangalore, Thiruvananthapuram and Bangalore. Since due to the non availability of the land in Bangalore, we are not in a position to expand here,” he said.

The company is also set to hit the one lakh employment mark early next year. Currently Infosys employs 80,501 people and intends to hire 9500 people in the third quarter and 4500 in the fourth quarter.

“However, we are also facing attrition. We have experienced 0.5 per cent increase in the attrition this quarter because people are looking at taking a break from the employment for higher studies. Around 1300 people this year left Infosys for higher studies,” said Pai.

Meanwhile, Infosys has made 18,000 offers for the coming year in 1000 colleges. “In the campus recruitment we have made 18,000 offers from the top 1000 colleges in the country, added Pai. The company has trained over 31,000 students under the campus connect program.

On the expansion of the Mysore campus, Pai said that the work has been slowed down.

“All of a sudden there is a shortage of cement in the market. Costs have also increased drastically. A cement bag worth Rs 200 is now quoting Rs 270. Also there is a shortage of workers. Because of these problems our expansion work at Mysore campus has slow down,” he added.

During last 12 months, rupee appreciated to Rs 39.92 from a high of Rs 44.98 per dollar, an increase of Rs 5

Infosys Technologies Ltd will suffer a loss of Rs 2000 crore in top-line revenue in the financial year 2007-'08 due to rupee appreciation.

"We have factored a loss of Rs 2000 crore in consolidated income and Rs 250 crore in net profit due to rupee appreciation for the entire fiscal (FY 2008) at the current rate of Rs 39.50 per US dollar,” said V Balakrishnan, CFO of the company.

“Though the currency appreciation may move both ways, any further rise in the rupee during the remaining two quarters of this fiscal may hit our annual revenue guidance despite hedging," he added.

During the last 12 months, the rupee appreciated to Rs 39.92 from a high of Rs 44.98 per dollar, an increase of Rs 5. In the first six months of this fiscal, the rupee surged to Rs 39.50 in end-September from Rs 43.10 in March.

Expressing hope that the dollar would stabilise around Rs 39-40 despite volatility in the forex market, Balakrishnan said appreciation was not confined to Indian rupee alone, as evident from similar trend in the currencies of South East Asian and Eastern European countries.

"In Brazil, the currency has doubled vis-à-vis the US dollar. No developing country is free of currency appreciation. One of the reasons for rupee appreciation is huge inflow of dollars, which the Indian economy cannot absorb totally. Huge oil imports is another determining factor," Balakrishnan pointed out.

To lessen the impact of a surging rupee, the IT bellwether has increased its currency exposure by $500 million from $900 million to $1.4 billion till September.

"We are proactively hedging our currency exposure to mitigate the impact of rupee appreciation. For the short-term, we will continue to hedge in the current range and review our hedging position if the rupee moves upwards. We are hoping the rupee will move both ways despite volatility," Balakrishnan asserted.

Despite an appreciating rupee, the company has improved its operating margins by 250 basis points (2.5 percent) to 32.5 percent in the second quarter (July-Sept) from 30 percent in the previous quarter (April-June) of this fiscal.

Operating cash flows increased to Rs 1144 crore during the quarter under review (Q2) from Rs 961 crore in the same period a year ago.

"Lower visa costs, increase in pricing by 1.9 percent and better utilisation rates have enabled us to maintain healthy operating and net margins in a competitive market place," chief operating officer S D Shibulal said.

Chief executive officer and managing director S Gopalakrishnan said the company would be able to sustain double-digit growth despite a surging rupee by client acquisition and expansion of its service offerings.

"Though these are challenging times, we are on a strong foot to face competition and sustain growth through our global delivery model, which enables us to address the risk factors," Gopalakrishnan affirmed.

The company also shored up its cash reserves to a whopping Rs 7319 crore at the end of September, as against Rs 4327 crore a year ago.