Wipro eyeing cos with new biz model

[jayanthi mandhalapu]

 Wipro is scouting for acquisition of leading technology companies with new business model of the future and is evaluating a few candi
dates for large buyouts, a key company official said.

"We continue to be active in acquisitions," the Bangalore-based, New York Stock Exchange Limited company's Chief Financial Officer Suresh Senapaty said.

"We are looking at acquisitions which can fill in some of the gaps that we have in our practices and our verticals and our geographies and/or in terms of technologies which are going to be technologies of Horizon 2 and Horizon 3 which means which will be some of value to us... new model of business going to be after two years and after five years," he said.

Senapaty indicated that Wipro's acquisitions, whenever they are made, would be large, saying the company generally avoided very small companies because "the impact is not going to be felt."

"We don't have (acquisition) size restrictions. But it has to fit from strategic point of view, it has to fit from cultural point of view and from financial strategy point of view," he added.

Senapaty said Wipro was currently evaluating a few "candidates" for acquisitions. "We are continuously looking at it," he said, adding, the company's M & A (mergers and acquisitions) team was continuously scouting for target companies from strategic point of view.

He said Wipro was looking for growth in India and from other emerging markets and also in some segments in US and Europe "which are showing improvement."

Senapaty said there was some amount of stability in the market for outsourced IT services in the current quarter (July-September 2009), unlike the previous quarters.

"The confidence stems from what customers are telling us, pipeline on which we are working and also based on the deals that we have already won, he added.