Our industry outperformance is not a one-year story

Midcap information technology (IT) services firm Hexaware Technologies returned to public markets with the country's largest initial public offering (IPO) by an IT services company. The firm also announced its full-year 2024 results, reporting 13.7 per cent year-on-year growth. R SRIKRISHNA, chief executive officer (CEO) of Hexaware, discusses with Shivani Shinde in Mumbai the timing of the IPO and the company's growth strategy. Edited excerpts:

- R SRIKRISHNA

The timing of Hexaware's IPO was unusual, given that the sector is experiencing one of its slowest growth phases and market conditions are shifting. What was the rationale behind it?

I'm not overly concerned about daily stock price fluctuations—we are in this for the long term. Our investors have already seen strong returns. In fact, a down market presents an even better opportunity for investors to enter.

One way to look at it is that we were the last to go public in a challenging market. The day we listed, the market wasn't at its best, but that didn't deter us.

The reality is that every company, regardless of industry, is striving to become a platform-driven business. There is no shortage of long-term, secular demand for our services.

How do you see the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on growth?

There is some truth to the statement that software engineering will be compressed. If I need to write a piece of code, it'll take me less time, but the volume of code that needs to be written is multiplying all the time.

The current slowdown for the sector has been the longest. How has it impacted you?