Infosys expects to regain premier status, says CEO Vishal Sikka

Once an IT bellwether, Infosys expects to regain its premier status and beat industry growth rates in the next 18-30 months. The $8-billion-plus company's market performance has been improving with every quarter and its latest results are reflective of that, says chief executive officer (CEO) Vishal Sikka.

"I would say another one-and-a-half to two-and-a-half years to beat the industry growth rate," Sikka told news agency PTI. Sikka was asked about the time Infosys will take to regain its bellwether status and beat IT-ITeS industry growth rate. Sikka, the first non-founder CEO of Infosys, was brought from German software major SAP last year to revive the company's fortunes.

Nasscom, which represents over $120 billion IT-ITeS industry, expects the sector's exports to grow by 13-15 per cent in 2014-15 fiscal as against 13 per cent in 2013-14. On the other hand, Infosys has given a revenue guidance of 7-9 per cent in dollar terms and 5.6-7.6 per cent in rupee terms for this fiscal. Substantiating his statement, Sikka said that the firm has $ 5.53 billion is cash, zero debt and strong margin performance in the quarter.

"We increased our utilisation to 82.7 per cent in the quarter. This was the highest level that we have seen in the last 11 years in any quarters. Our volume growth was 4.2 per cent. This is the highest sequential volume growth in the last 3 years over any quarter."

Infosys had reported 13-per cent jump in consolidated net profit for the third quarter at Rs 3,250 crore helped by increase in business and clients from North America as also from India. Consolidated revenue rose 5.9 per cent to Rs 13,796 crore in the quarter while it maintained its revenue outlook for the entire fiscal.

Increasing its focus on software products and new age solutions like Artificial Intelligence, Internet of Things, Infosys also said that it has expanded its innovation fund from the $100 million to $500 million, which will be used to invest in young firms worldwide.