| Growing Infosys prepares for bigger orders |
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European revenues grew by slightly less than 50% in Q3, to reach $139m for the quarter, now accounting for 25% of worldwide revenues (up from 22% in Q3 2005).
EMEA is now not only the company's fastest-growing geography but also its most profitable in operating-margin terms. The region's profit margins of 36% are 3 percentage points higher than in the US, thanks to a higher proportion of outsourcing and more profitable discretionary projects.
Infosys is seeking bigger orders from its 206 customers that each earn the company annual revenue exceeding $1m. That would help Infosys double sales to a | |
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| | projected $2bn-plus in the year ending March 31, after surpassing the $1bn mark in March 2004.
The company also said it was building a "deeper bench", hiring or keeping more people that it currently has work for. While this would cost Infosys an estimated 50-75 basis points in margin, large numbers of staff who can be deployed quickly on new contracts would allow the company to bid on bigger contracts.
Infosys continues to invest in its consulting subsidiary, Infosys Consulting, delaying its break-even slightly because it has stepped up its hiring.
In October Infosys said it earns about 40% of its revenue from services, including | |
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| | consulting and computer network management, that it started in the past five years.
In the report Forrester Wave: Indian Vendor Consulting Capabilities, Stephanie Moore of Forrester Research said: "Infosys...is best positioned to offer high-value management consulting skills. Of all the vendors profiled [in the report], Infosys is most able to compete with both the former Big Five firms for business process consulting work and the tier-one Indian vendors for the follow-on technical work."
The company raised its full-year earnings-per-share forecast to 89.9-90.3 rupees ($2.03-$2.04), or | |
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| | 30.7-31.3% growth against 29.4-30% estimated previously.
Infosys said its profit was impacted by about $2m because of the rupee's volatility. While the depreciation of the rupee during the quarter - 2.3% - resulted in a benefit of $10.3m, the company lost $12.6m on hedging costs.
The company added 36 customers in the third quarter after gaining 70 clients in the first half of this fiscal year, taking its total client base to 454.
Infosys employed 3,226 more people in the three months ended December 31 after adding 6,390 workers, its highest ever in a quarter, in the preceding three months.
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| | Infosys Technologies, which reported third-quarter results in line with market expectations, raised its full-year profit and sales forecasts for the second time this fiscal year.
It said net profit in the third quarter ended December rose to 6.49bn rupees ($147m) from 4.97bn rupees in the same period a year ago, a 31% rise, while revenue rose 35% to 25.32bn rupees.
The results compared with a consensus net profit of 6.49bn rupees on revenue of 25.21bn rupees in a Reuters poll of industry analysts in 10 brokerages.
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