Troubled clients drag Wipro’s Q4 net down

Bengaluru, April 25

Faring below market expectations, India’s third largest software services firm Wipro on Tuesday posted over 20 per cent annual decline in its consolidated profit at Rs 1,800.8 crore for the quarter ended March 2018.

Wipro had registered a profit of Rs 2,267 crore in the year-ago period, as per Indian accounting norms. “The total income stood at Rs 14,304.6 crore compared to Rs 15,045.5 crore in the January-March period of 2016-17, down by 4.9 per cent. For the year ended March 2018, Wipro’s profit fell 6 per cent to Rs 8,003.1 crore, while total income dipped 1.7 per cent to Rs 57,035.8 crore compared to the previous financial year,” the company said.

Wipro CEO Abidali Neemuchwala said the company entered Q4 with a confidence driven by the improvements it saw in “our deal win trajectory, uptick in client mining, our performance in digital and reduced headwinds in some of our businesses”.    “However, we are disappointed at the loss of momentum in Q1 due to surprises arising out of bankruptsies faced by two of our clients with a revenue run rate of over $50 million, addition impact in the HPS business as more clients exit the exchange market and weakness in our communication BU.”

He was confident that the company would return to growth trajectory starting Q2 due to its strong deal wins and order booking coupled with the continued strength in digital.  The firm claimed its digital revenue grew 9% sequentially and 27.6% on a y-o-y basis in Q4 constituting 26.7% of its revenue.  — PTI