The country’s third largest software exporter Wipro has reported a growth of 1.23 percent in consolidated net profit for the quarter ended 31st March 2011, to Rs 1,334.9 crore.

Last year, the company had posted a net profit of Rs 1,318.6 crore for the fourth quarter, as per international accounting standards.

Net income from sales during the reporting quarter stood at Rs 8,564 crore, as against Rs 7,236.4 crore in Q1 FY’11, up 18.34 percent.

“We are seeing early signs of positive momentum after the re-organisation. Clients continue to focus on optimising operations, creating new products and getting access to newer markets. We will continue to make investments that bring superior value to our clients as they try to win in this market,” Wipro Chairman Azim Premji said in a statement on Wednesday.

IT services, which contributed 75 percent to the company’s revenues in Q1, FY’12, stood at USD 1,408 million, a sequential increase of 0.5 percent and a year-on-year increase of 16.9 percent.

The company said it expects its revenues from the IT services business to be in the range of USD 1,436 million to USD 1,464 million for the second quarter ending 30^th September 2011.

The IT services division hired 4,105 new people this quarter, taking its total headcount to 1,26,490 employees as of 30^thJune 2011. It added 49 new customers during the reporting quarter.

“Our investments in client mining are starting to show results, with four customers contributing more than USD 100 million of revenues. We have maintained our operating margins in the current quarter despite one month impact of salary revision,” Wipro Executive Director and Chief Financial Officer Suresh Senapaty said.

On a standalone basis, the company has reported a net profit of Rs 1,219.3 crore for the quarter, a growth of 9.84 percent from Rs 1,110 crore in the same period last year.

The company’s cash and cash equivalents stood at Rs 5,075.2 crore as of 30^th June 2011.

Sales of IT products accounted for 12 percent of total company revenue in Q1 FY’12, at Rs 1,006 crore, a growth of 21 percent year-on-year.

Wipro’s consumer care and lighting business recorded revenues of Rs 755 crore in Q1, FY’12, an increase of 18 percent y-o-y and accounting for 9 percent of Wipro’s total revenues during the quarter.

May take 2-3 quarters to return to higher growth rate

Leading software giant Wipro on Wednesday said it may take 2-3 quarters to catch up with the growth rate of rivals like TCS and HCL Technologies on the back of a strong deal pipeline and organisational restructuring that it undertook at the beginning of the year.

“We have messaged consistently from the time we started this whole process that it is going to take us 2-3 quarters to get back to industry leading growth rates,” Wipro CEO (IT Business) T K Kurien said.

“Some of the other numbers that we have produced around hiring, deal wins, I would look at those as indicators of what we believe the future will look like,” he added.

Wipro beat market expectations by posting a growth of 1.23 per cent in consolidated net profit for the quarter ended 30th June, 2011, to Rs 1,334.9 crore.

Net income from sales during the reporting quarter stood at Rs 8,564 crore, as against Rs 7,236.4 crore in Q1, FY’11, up 18.34 per cent.

“We are hitting on two fronts — one on getting volume back and changing the quality of revenue,” Kurien said.

The company said it is witnessing strong demand and client wins. During the quarter, Wipro added 49 new customers.

“Our pipeline today is building up and that gives us the confidence… We have gone through in terms of simplification of structure… Ultimately, when we get to the stage in which we are, we believe that whatever we have done now will reflect itself in volume growth and more importantly in terms of quality of revenue,” Kurien said.

Rivals Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and Infosys have also indicated strong demand for software services despite the global economic uncertainty.

IT industry chamber NASSCOM has predicted 16-18 per cent growth in IT exports from India in the current fiscal.