India Inc is shying away from investing in digital technologies.
ITC Ltd on Friday reported a 23.09 per cent increase in consolidated net profit at Rs 5,070.09 crore for the third quarter ended December 2022, helped by growth momentum across its operating segments. The diversified company had posted a net profit of Rs 4,118.80 crore during the October-December quarter of the previous fiscal, ITC said in a regulatory filing. Its revenue from operations was up 3.56 per cent to Rs 19,020.65 crore during the quarter under review, as against Rs 18,365.80 crore in the corresponding period of the previous fiscal.
The resolution seeking his reappointment as chairman and managing director of the diversified conglomerate will be put to vote at the company's annual general meeting to be held on August 11, 2023, according to a notice sent to the shareholders on Tuesday. The company under Puri drove the 'ITC Next' strategy in the last four years encompassing digital acceleration, cost optimisation, investing in new growth vectors and ensuring supply chain agility, its officials said.
Diversified entity ITC Ltd on Thursday reported a 22.66 per cent rise in consolidated net profit at Rs 5,225.02 crore in the fourth quarter ended March 2023, led by a strong growth momentum across operating segments. The company had posted a net profit of Rs 4,259.68 crore a year ago, ITC Ltd said in a regulatory filing. Its revenue from operations increased 7 per cent to Rs 18,799.18 crore in the period under review against Rs 17,754.02 crore in the year-ago period.
About 60 per cent of Indian private insurers believe there has been a significant rise in insurance-related frauds, and as risks lurk there is an immediate need to consider a proactive fraud risk management framework, a Deloitte survey said on Thursday. Insurance companies in India have experienced a rise in fraud instances in life and health insurance, and increased digitisation, remote working post pandemic and weakened controls are key factors contributing to frauds, according to Deloitte's Insurance Fraud Survey 2023. "About 60 per cent of survey respondents believe that there has been a significant rise in fraud, while further 10 per cent experienced a marginal increase," the survey said.
Ex-Infosys CFO V Balakrishnan said the IT companies 'have to get employees who understand new technologies, they have to get rid of some of the employees, who are more on the legacy, and try to attract talent which is more digital'.
Luxury carmaker Mercedes-Benz India on Thursday said it will increase prices of its vehicles ranging between Rs 2 lakh to Rs 12 lakh across different models from April 1, to offset rising input costs specially the adverse impact of foreign exchange. This will be the second time in three months that the company is increasing prices of its vehicles. The ex-showroom price of the company's model range will increase by up to 5 per cent from April 1, 2023, the company said.
ITC has extensively reset its strategy and will explore opportunities to craft disruptive business models to set up structural drivers helmed by digital and sustainability for its next horizon of growth and make the company future-ready, chairman Sanjiv Puri said on Wednesday. The company is pursuing an accelerated journey to build a dynamic utureTech' enterprise by investing in cutting-edge digital technologies to shape a new paradigm of competitiveness, create innovative business models and tap newer opportunities, he said while addressing shareholders at ITC's virtual annual general meeting. As part of the next horizon vision, the company is "proactively exploring inorganic opportunities" even as it has shrunk "business segments that were incongruent to our growth aspirations, such as the Lifestyle Retailing Business" while the existing growth platforms comprising megabrands will be scaled up and fortified.
Information technology, consulting and business process services company, Wipro on Thursday announced that it has signed an agreement to acquire Ampion, an Australia-based provider of cyber security, DevOps and quality engineering services. "Ampion has a successful track record and enjoys immense credibility with leading enterprises in the region, a collaborative work culture, and significant local subject matter expertise. "We see Ampion as a complementary force that will help us expand our footprint and accelerate our journey in the Asia Pacific region," CEO APMEA, Wipro, N S Bala said. Wipro's new operating model emphasises strategic investments in focus geographies, proximity to customers, agility, scale and localisation, the Bengaluru-headquartered company said in a statement.
Telecom operator Bharti Airtel on Monday announced an agreement to acquire about 25 per cent equity stake in Bengaluru-based technology startup Lavelle Networks. Further, ASM Technologies, a global technology engineering and product development services provider, has done a follow on investment in Lavelle Networks. In a statement on Monday, Airtel announced the acquisition of about 25 per cent strategic stake in SD-WAN startup Lavelle Networks but did not disclose financial details about the deal that entails a cash consideration.
India's role as a leader of the global south may require it to give up its ambition to serve as a bridge between the warring halves of the international community, points out Mihir S Sharma.
Billionaire Mukesh Ambani has set targets for his three kids whom he has identified for takeover of telecom, retail and new energy business. Speaking at his father Dhirubhai's anniversary, celebrated as Reliance Family Day, he said the oil-to-telecom-to-retail conglomerate Reliance industries Ltd has embarked on a journey of comprehensive self-transformation. "The end of 2022 is when Reliance will have crossed the half-way mark of its Golden Decade.
Revenue rises 20.7% to Rs 36,854 crore.
A hotel in 1975, entry into paperboards in 1979, India's dominant cigarette maker, ITC, read the tea - or tobacco - leaves early, leveraged its enterprise strengths and stepped up the diversification agenda to create multiple drivers of growth. Some failed, some faltered, some were transformational, adding steadily to the top line. Now those efforts are making a difference: margins from non-cigarettes - FMCG, hotels, agri, paperboards, paper and packaging - are expanding and profits are kicking in more significantly than ever before.
IT services firms' revenue growth in the fourth quarter will be affected by macro-driven headwinds, lower working-days, and the fact of the three-month period being low season. Analysts are expecting FY24 growth to be muted. Revenue growth will decline 600-700 basis points to 10-12 per cent for FY24, said a CRISIL Ratings report. The 10-12 per cent growth rate is a fall from the 18-20 per cent expected in FY23 and around 19 per cent growth in FY22, the highest in eight years, said the CRISIL Ratings report.
Infosys will focus on stabilisation in FY19 followed by building momentum the following year, and acceleration thereafter.
FMCG major HUL on Friday announced the appointment of Rohit Jawa as the managing director & chief executive officer to succeed Sanjiv Mehta who will retire from the company after leading it for a decade. Jawa, presently the Chief of Transformation for Unilever, would take over the leadership role for a term of five consecutive years with effect from June 27, 2023, the company said in a statement. "The appointment of Rohit Jawa as a whole-time director and MD & CEO will be subject to approval of Shareholders and other statutory approvals as may be applicable," it added.
IT firms Infosys and Mphasis on Tuesday said they will create employment for about 2,000 people, while Wipro will invest pound 16 million (about Rs 163 crore) in the UK over the next few years. The announcements were made ahead of the virtual summit between UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi on Tuesday. Infosys said it plans to hire 1,000 workers in the UK over the next three years as part of efforts to support the country's economic recovery and growth.
Revenue up 15.8% at Rs 34,261 crore over year-ago period.
IT major Infosys and Microsoft have entered into a multi-year strategic engagement with Ausgrid to accelerate the cloud transformation of the largest electricity distributor on Australia's east coast. This programme will further Ausgrid's vision to connect communities and empower lives with a focus on affordability, reliability and sustainability, Infosys said in a regulatory filing on Monday. "With over 4 million Australians relying on our services every day, it is essential we are maintaining our high standard of reliability and connectivity, as well as delivering on the expectations of Australian communities," Nick Crowe, acting CIO at Ausgrid, said.
'The skilling gap is a serious issue.' 'We partner with the government on skilling, but as a company we have several skilling programmes, and we work closely with the partner ecosystem.
N Ganapathy Subramaniam, chief operating officer (COO), discusses the strategy to concert digital opportunities to larger deals, focus on reskilling own people instead of acquiring a company to get access to skillsets and demand from newer verticals in an interview with Romita Majumdar
For Krish Shankar, executive vice-president & group head of human resource (HR) development at Infosys, the defining moment of the pandemic on the HR department has been the importance that reskilling and learning have managed to get. For Infosys, the focus on reskilling started three to four years back as business saw a shift towards digital, and the pandemic has really brought the importance of reskilling to the fore. "In the past, certification courses or taking up an e-learning course was just a way towards promotion, and was not taken too seriously.
FMCG major Hindustan Unilever Ltd on Thursday reported a 10.7 per cent increase in its consolidated net profit at Rs 2,100 crore for the first quarter ended June, 2021 led by a volume-based growth despite challenging circumstances due to the second wave of the pandemic. The company had posted a net profit of Rs 1,897 crore in the April-June quarter of the previous fiscal. Net sales during the quarter under review stood at Rs 11,996 crore, up 13.49 per cent, as against Rs 10,570 crore in the corresponding period a year ago, Hindustan Unilever Ltd (HUL) said in a regulatory filing.
Industries with the highest number of top-rated companies at risk were hospitality/travel, media and entertainment, retail, financial services and consumer goods/manufacturing
'Generic skills are in abundance, but technological advancements have left staple skills redundant.' 'It is why employers are now looking for alternate sources of hiring -- deploying gig workers, looking at Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities for relevant talent.'
The average top executive monthly compensation is Rs 1 crore. The median employee salary is now Rs 820,000.
Adani Enterprises, the flagship company of the Adani group, on Monday said it had entered into a 50:50 joint venture (JV) with EdgeConnex, a leading global data centre operator, to develop and operate data centres across India. The idea behind the JV, AdaniConneX, was to leverage the two partners' complementary expertise and capabilities, it said. In addition to full-scale data centres, AdaniConneX will also develop a portfolio of Edge data centres strategically located across the country to address the need for more proximate capacity.
What is driving the digital-first approach of traditional, legacy brands? Apart from the growing adoption of the internet in the country, brands are drawn to the agility of the medium.
Candidates need to be agile to understand the situation, be receptive to unlearn and learn and adapt accordingly, advises Sanjeev Verma, vice president-HR, STT GDC India.
In 2017, when Infosys announced that Salil Parekh would be its next chief executive officer (CEO) and managing director (MD), very few in the industry or the analyst community doubted his ability to bring the company back to a healthy growth trajectory, improve morale within the company and, more importantly, win the promoters' trust and investor confidence. There were reasons for this confidence. He was not only the deputy CEO of the Paris-headquartered IT services major Capgemini, but also one of the only non-European faces on the executive board of the company.
Leadership, teamwork, communication, productivity, and wellness skills are essential for every employee's success.
Equipped with a host of features including seats with massaging function, climate control, remote controlled door, 15 speaker surround sound system, the car also has agility control suspension system.
Continuing with the same behaviour while things around you change is a sure recipe for failure. Successful leaders will demonstrate agility and adaptability.
The further expansion and upgrade of the Chinese military does not augur well for India, which continues to confront an increasingly belligerent China on its borders, notes former foreign secretary Shyam Saran.
The pandemic helped many entrepreneurs including me realise the power of people who share your passion, says fashion entrepreneur Meghna Saraogi.
IT industry's growth will largely be led by next-generation technologies and services with areas like data, cloud and cybersecurity expected to see huge incremental growth, Wipro CEO Theirry Delaporte said. Wipro has also closed several acquisitions in the second half of FY21 across key markets like the US and Europe, which has helped the Bengaluru-based company strengthen its local presence and service offerings, he said in his note in the company's FY2020-21 annual report. "We know that industry growth will largely be led by next-generation technologies and services. "We can therefore expect to see huge incremental growth in areas such as digital, cloud, data, engineering, cybersecurity.
If we work together with dedication, concentration and effort, we should be able to achieve our aspirational growth target of double-digits for a very long period of time, suggests K V Kamath.
If you are an expert in programming languages, statistics and algebra, then a career in AI and ML is worth a shot in 2021.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday called for focus on 'repair and prepare' as the nation emerges out of a devastating pandemic. "Over the past year, we have witnessed a lot of disruption in different sectors. Much of it is still there. Yet, disruption does not have to mean despair," he said at VivaTech Summit. "Instead, we must keep the focus on the twin foundations of repair and prepare," he said referring to the need to augment healthcare infrastructure in the country as well as prop up the economy.
