Increased focus on Non Linear Revenue growth by TCS for FY 2013 growth

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) became the first $10-billion Indian IT company in March 2012 and this significant achievement is fueled by the solid base it created over the past few decades and the domain depth & expertise it has acquired across different domains. Despite the persisting macroeconomic challenges, slower GDP growth & job growth, and continued currency volatility, TCS, in FY2011-12, registered 15 % increase in net profit to Rs 13,517 crore, while its revenue increased 31% to Rs 48,894 crore. TCS believes there is significant potential for growth as the addressable market is still large which is also expanding continuously and market growth is further assured with relatively low current level of penetration. To further fuel the growth momentum TCS is focusing its efforts to generate more revenue from its non-linear businesses that includes three strategic initiatives-- software products (TCS financial solutions), platform-based BPO, and iON (IT-as-a-service solution for small and medium businesses). It is also planning to increase its focus on new technologies such as smartphones, mobility and cloud to drive growth and has made significant investments in these areas. TCS, with a brand value of $4.1 billion is competing with the big boys like IBM, HP and Accenture.

TCS Financial Solutions increased its client base by adding 39 new clients in FY12. TCS BaNCS is a market ready universal financial platform for banking, capital markets and insurance, offered by TCS FS. Recently Malaysia-based financial services group AmBank has decided to deploy 'TCS BaNCS', integrated banking suite, spanning conventional and Islamic banking, will support both retail banking and lending functionalities and also has bagged a contract from South Africa's Nedgroup Insurance Company (NIC) for deploying TCS BaNCS Insurance, part of the it's financial services platform, will serve as the new policy administration system for Nedgroup short-term insurance services. TCS also announced that Letshego Holdings (LHL), a leading consumer lending company based in Botswana, has selected the TCS BaNCS suite as the core banking system for its Greenfield venture into retail banking in Africa. The integrated core banking solution will process loans and deposits across seven countries in Africa — Botswana, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, Namibia and Mozambique. TCS is increasing its focus on Africa as it is trying to increase its revenues from the region.

iON uses scalable cloud computing technology to deliver automation suite to SMBs, eliminating the need for them to invest in any IT assets and requiring them to pay monthly rentals rather than a one-time license fee. The suite includes human resource management, customer relationship management, payroll and finance management solutions along with niche industry-specific solutions. iON is being marketed through a channel partner network of 109 cloud service providers and has 256 mid-market customers. The company also said that it wants to ramp up over 1,000 customers this year and targets a revenue of $1 billion in the next five years.

Through its Platform-based BPO offering, it offers services in segments like Life Insurance and Pension Policy, Analytics and Finance and Accounts. TCS was the first Indian IT Services Vendor who initiated platform-based BPO in 2007 as the then CEO, S Ramadorai felt that platform-based services can be ‘templatised’ and some processes can be leveraged across different sectors. This strategy has been successful for TCS as it yielded dividends and this offering has been well received by TCS clients, which has been proven by the fact that TCS has bagged multi-million dollar deals in life insurance and pension policy, analytics and finance and accounts verticals. For example, since some processes in retail are similar to manufacturing which will eliminate the need to develop applications or write codes from scratch. Diligenta, UK subsidiary of the company has won the Friends Life Deal based on its insurance platform offerings. TCS has aggressively invested in developing its Platform BPO offerings in the past few years.

According to Motilal Oswal Report on TCS, as a part of its disruptive innovation strategies, TCS is increasing investments in many areas including new sensor-based technologies, intelligent infrastructure, platforms for genomic research, information fusion for enterprises and green technologies. The company has significantly increased its intellectual property (IP). It filed 460 patents in FY12. Cumulatively, TCS has filed 855 patents till date, of which 72 have been granted.

In the recent TCS Annual General meeting, Ratan Tata announced TCS's growth plans, "Our focus is to find a balance between traditional markets like the US and Europe and other emerging markets like Australia and the Middle East, which present good opportunities. Going forward, TCS will be focusing on non-linear growth since the situation in the West continues to be a concern."  Future opportunities for TCS are extremely good and banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI) segment continues to be the thrust area for the company, TCS CEO and MD N Chandrasekaran added.  The company has opened multiple development centers in Latin America, China and Philippines. With all these initiatives, TCS is hoping ride over the economic volatility and demand concerns and company is all set to a lead revenue growth in FY13 too. TCS expects analytics, mobility, cloud computing and non-linear platform-based services to contribute 10% of its total revenues by 2014-2015, which will be around $1 billion given the company’s $10 billion-plus revenue last fiscal.