Wipro’s consulting business Capco sees “green shoots”

Wipro

Wipro on April 19 said it sees green shoots in its consulting business Capco, a division that has been troubling the company ever since demand environment started deteriorating.

Consulting businesses are usually the first ones to see a decline in revenue when adverse macroeconomic issues affect demand. On the other hand, these businesses are also the first ones to rebound as and when the macroeconomic situation improves.

Capco has grown 6.6% sequentially and shows some early signs of stability, chief financial officer Aparna C Iyer said, while addressing the media after declaring the fourth quarter results of fiscal year 2023-24.

Chief Executive Officer Srinivas Pallia echoed similar views saying, "The good news is that when there are green shoots in BFSI (banking, financial services, and insurance), it will be consulting-led."

Adding that BFSI revenues in the consulting space have gone up for two consecutive quarters.

"We are going to use Capco as a consulting-led (offering) for any of the solutions that we do... so now we have to pick the spear as we go into the market. And what we need to do is bring in a lot more synergy and we have seen these happen, and we'll continue to focus on that," Pallia explained.

Wipro acquired the British consulting firm for $1.45 billion three years ago, and is one of the world’s largest and independent financial services management consultancy.

Wipro's management said the company has been successfully integrating Capco, something that analysts had pointed out would be a challenge when the deal was struck in 2021.

Pallia said had it not been for economic slowdown, the process of integrating Capco would have been much faster.

The company is also able to corner premium pricing from the consulting business even in the present scenario, Iyer said.

Pallia was appointed as the CEO and MD of Wipro on April 6, following the surprise resignation of Thierry Delaporte, who quit the position a year ahead of the end of his term. Delaporte was appointed in May 2020 for a period of five years.

New Jersey-based Pallia, who has spent 32 years at Wipro, earlier led Americas 1 and spent a significant part of his career in sales.