HCLTech working on over 200 Gen AI PoCs, many enter production

HCLTech CEO and MD C Vijayakumar

Information technology (IT) company HCLTech has over 200 Proof of Concepts (PoC) for Generative Artificial Intelligence (Gen AI), with several of them rolling out into production.

“Roughly 200+ Proof of Concepts are there and several of them are in actual work for clients to scale. We continue to witness a lot of traction on AI and Gen AI-related opportunities,” HCLTech CEO C Vijaykumar said at a press conference, after declaring the first quarter earnings ended June 30, 2024.

In January, HCLTech Chairperson Roshni Nadar Malhotra told Moneycontrol that the company has around 170 Gen AI PoCs.

Vijaykumar said the Noida-headquartered firm has multiple ongoing engagements with clients to deliver real value with Gen AI projects.

Previously, the company had launched a Gen AI automation platform called HCLTech AI Force and HCLTech Enterprise AI Foundry, to simplify and scale enterprise AI journeys.

To give an example, the CEO said, a global technology major selected HCLTech to implement a Gen AI-based solution for gaming review analysis, which resulted in significant workload reduction for the client. The project included automation of data collection, sentiment analysis, operational automation, and deploying Gen AI to transform the content lifecycle management and processes.

Nonetheless, the management said it is not ready to call out any bookings or revenue numbers on Gen AI deals at this point. “When we are ready, we will let you know,” they said.

On July 11, India’s largest software exporter Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) said it has $1.5 billion worth of AI and Gen AI projects in the pipeline as of Q1, closing in with rival Accenture’s $2 billion in cumulative Gen AI revenue.

However, these engagements continue to be for smaller-duration projects, TCS’ management had said.

At a time when companies are in the race to declare Gen AI revenues, experts question how many can be scaled up for value to be derived.

Also read: Only 10% of 300-400 Gen AI implementations have scaled, delivered value, says TCS

HCLTech said it is investing substantially in upskilling employees with Gen AI skills. In the past year, the company trained and certified approximately 42,000 employees.

"Every quarter we need to add incrementally about 20,000 people, trained and certified. So that at the end of the year, we'll cross the 100,000 mark," HCLTech Chief People Officer Ramachandran Sundararajan said. "We are on track to achieve this goal."

The company employs almost 2,20,000 people.

"So our focus is on upskilling continues both in terms of what we do for Gen AI as well as broader data and analytic skills," Sundararajan added.

Also read: HCLTech sees headcount decline by 8,080 in Q1FY25