Azim Premji, the man in the driving seat of Indian outsourcing company Wipro for more than 40 years, is still very much at the center of the company's drive for growth.
What comes through time and time again in speaking with the chairman of the IT and business process outsourcing (BPO) specialist is his focus on the long term view and his concern with the welfare of the societies from which Wipro--a company worth around US$5 billion and present in more than 50 countries--draws its personnel.
Clearly the failing world economy is a concern to global businesses such as Wipro. Premji takes the pragmatic view of many leaders of dominant companies: if he continues to do the things that put him in front in the first place, Wipro will come out ahead of its rivals.
"The calculated growth in India in 2008-2009 is set to be 21 percent to 24 percent growth on a US$40 billion base of experts," he noted. "Last year it was 28 percent. We think industrial growth rates will reflect that trend. Leading companies in India will grow faster than the average companies."
Premji sees improving productivity and building up consultancy services as possible ways of riding out the downturn.
He said: "Leading companies use slowdowns as opportunities to gain market share over rivals. We did that in the dotcom meltdown and we are doing it again now."
Energy, utilities and manufacturing are likely to be the leading sectors in terms of business growth for Wipro, as the emerging consumer markets of India and China demand more consumables and energy. Financial services is the market for Wipro's services that will be hit hardest, added Premji.
Caution will be key going forward. "The one obvious threat to the business is the uncertainty in global markets. Is it going to get worse? In the U.S., possibly no. In Europe--maybe a little. We need to watch the oil situation. We need to be careful of the uncertainty Russia has created [after the recent military conflict in Georgia]," he says.
The increasing globalization of talent is one trend Premji believes will affect Wipro's fortunes. Although the company has a global reach, its skill base is concentrated in the Far East. Premji points out there are approximately 500,000 engineers in India, compared to about 30,000 in the United Kingdom.
Wipro's competitors are already opening talent pools all over the world. Rivals such as Accenture and CapGemini are establishing R&D centers in the emerging markets of China, Russia and South America, Premji noted. Meanwhile, Infosys bought a SAP specialist based in the United Kingdom in August.
At the same time, customer expectations have risen, prompting Wipro to review the level of service it offers to its customer-base.
He said: "We have to be more proactive in the way we market our services. We get paid on solutions, not just time and materials."
One of the achievements Premji most values is his involvement in fostering talent. He is head of a foundation that contributes to the funding of education for 2.5 million children in 20,000 schools across India. According to him, it's an ethic U.K. companies and its government would do well to adopt.
He said: "In the U.K. and the rest of the Western world, young people are losing interest in building careers [in engineering]. They want easier and more exciting jobs. It's important that U.K. companies get involved in creating excitement that these careers are good careers. The government should train teachers how to teach science more creatively. Otherwise, the West will be starved of technical talent. This will only create social tensions."
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