Infosys, Wipro beat Street, differ on AI

Both raise headcount; HI revenue up for Infosys, down for Wipro

- Jas Bardia

Infosys added 8,203 employees to end September with 331,991.

Infosys Ltd put up a better-than-expected show in the September quarter and raised the lower end of its full-year guidance, even as it cautiously watched a turbulent world.

While cross-city rival Wipro Ltd too beat the Street, its performance paled in comparison, growing at a slower pace and profitability declined.

Infosys, India's second-largest IT services firm, ended the September quarter with $5.08 billion in revenue, up 2.66% from the June quarter and 3.77% from the previous year. More than half of the gains came from banks and financial institutions, the company's biggest client base.

The Q2 performance of Wipro, India's fourth-largest IT firm, was relatively sedate. Its revenue was $2.6 billion, up 0.65% sequentially and down 2.1% on a yearly basis. Like Infosys, much of its business was pulled up by banks, while revenue from most other verticals declined. Banks make up slightly more than a third of Wipro's business.

This wraps up earnings for India's five largest IT companies, with the biggest-Tata Consultancy Services, reporting the weakest performance and third-largest, HCL Technologies Ltd, proving to be an outlier.

TCS, HCL Tech and Tech Mahindra Ltd ended the second quarter with revenues of $7.47 billion, $3.64 billion and $1.59 billion, up 0.61%, 2.79% and 1.41% on a sequential basis, respectively.

Three of the Big Five grew revenues in the first half of the fiscal year. The rest didn't.

Revenue divergence