THE YEAR BROUGHT IN A LOT OF OPPORTUNITIES. WE SAW ALMOST ENTIRE INDUSTRY EMBRACING DIGITAL TECHNOLOGIES. ADDITIONALLY, THE SECTOR CONTINUES TO BE AMONG THE TOP SECTORS FROM A JOB CREATION AND HIRING PERSPECTIVE

Sanjay Jalona, CEO & MD, L&T, discusses the financial performance of his organisation for the year 2018-2019

What is your view of the performance so far of the Indian ICT industry in 2019? The Indian ICT industry continues to evolve in a progressive way. Despite of the fiscal starting on a cautious note, key players in the industry have registered a steady growth rate. The year brought in a lot of opportunities. We saw almost entire industry embracing digital technologies. Additionally, the sector continues to be among the top sectors from a job creation and hiring perspective thus contributing to nation’s development goals.

Overall, I feel the IT sector is poised for future growth, with technology being the key enabler for this growth. The digital opportunity is huge. So, while the competition will remain intense, a well-governed company will see good sustainable growth with continuous innovation.

What is your view on FY 19 in terms of business and financial performance? Please share any two key highlights?

LTI continued its robust growth journey in FY 2018-19. The broad-based growth involved all key verticals including the BFSI sector – a domain where peers had witnessed slow down.

We attribute the stellar growth to four key strategic differentiation: • Operating to transform for our clients • Assuming the role of data driven organisation enabler • Focusing on enriching end-user experience for our clients • Digitising the core to modernise the business intelligence framework of clients In terms of quantified figures, the following are the full year FY19 highlights that eventually resulted in LTI recording one of the best growth rates in the industry: In US Dollars: • Revenue at USD 1,349.1 million; growth of 19.1% YoY • Constant Currency Revenue growth of 20.9% YoY In Indian Rupees: • Revenue at Rs. 94,458 million; growth at 29.3% YoY • Net Income at Rs. 15,155 million; Net Income growth at 36.2% YoY

What is the way ahead in an environment of declining margins, softer IT spending and tighter outsourcing, and GDPR regime, in the traditional verticals?

LTI remains well prepared to counter the barriers to growth, if any. We have a well-diversified portfolio across industries, regions and services. This coupled with our rich-heritage which gives us unparalleled domain understanding and willingness to go the extra mile for clients differentiates us.

On the margins front, we have been very transparent and committed in conveying that we will deliver stable margins– a parameter which we have consistently delivered over the last three years since listing. Moreover, our growth has been broad-based with all key verticals of business focus registering healthy rise – both on a YoY as well as a QoQ comparison.

LTI’s digital services traction is one of the highest in the industry. The large deals traction too has picked pace since last year. Thus, our belief is that there is ample growth opportunity for the best fit and right solutions addressing the market and client needs.

What is your business outlook for FY 20, and what are the key focus areas?

We are confident of continuing our industry leading growth momentum to retain our position in the leader’s quadrant. In terms of margin guidance, we are committed to deliver stable margins in future.

At LTI, we believe the future of every industry lies at the convergence of physical and digital worlds, and we continue to invest in building capabilities that our clients will require to navigate this transformation. We believe that this approach ensures a wider scope of relevance and hence potential for growth.

Additionally, we will continue to evolve to serve as best fit technology partner for breakaway enterprisesenterprises that believe in carving out differentiation basis the following:

We are confident of continuing our industry leading growth momentum to retain our position in the leader’s quadrant. In terms of margin guidance, we are committed to deliver stable margins in future

Enabling new business models

• Cloud only, mobile only • Direct to customer • Enabling tech for the bottom billion

Enabling revenue growth

• Using as-a-service models • Faster time-to-market • Customer onboarding

Transforming customer & employee experiences

• Enabling digital ways of working • Seamless collaboration • Providing innovative services

Mastering next-gen efficient operations

• Extreme simplification • Using open source solutions

What is the influence of the emerging technologies? How will it impact the next couple of years?

We have witnessed enormous technology disruption during the last year. Enterprises of various scales are vivaciously embracing digital technologies. Cutting edge emerging technologies such as AI, IoT, AR, VR, and machine learning are progressively becoming mainstream, cutting across industries. These technologies are offering abundant new opportunities and enabling large enterprises as much as they are fueling innovation for the start-ups in developing new products and service lines, improving efficiency, productivity, and competence levels. Blockchain, for instance was originally considered as a tech disruption only in financial services and retail. However, it is now being heavily leveraged across healthcare, governance, logistics, etc.

While opening up a plethora of opportunities, these technology disruptions are also creating a need for enhancing skillset of IT professionals. The talent requirements for the new opportunities created by emerging technologies are different from that of the past. To monetise the opportunity, all IT players will have to make interventions in form of upskilling and reskilling.

Overall, we believe the future continues to look bright for the Indian IT-ITeS industry; all thanks to the power of these emerging technologies and the opportunities it continues to create.