WIPRO TECHNOLOGIES |
66% |
IT
services is Wipro's mainstay. Wipro Technologies (WT) accounted
for 90 per cent of the company's Rs 873.7-crore profit before
interest and taxes in 2001-02. As Wipro Ltd Vice Chairman and
Wipro Technologies CEO Vivek Paul, puts it, Wipro is "one business
really", a reference to WT's contribution to Wipro Ltd. |
WIPRO INFOTECH |
21% |
It's
no longer just hardware, Wipro Infotech's systems integration
play could see it emerge a significant player in the domestic
market. Its turnover shrank 14.5 per cent over the previous
year, but Wipro Infotech President Suresh Vaswani puts that
down to an unwillingness ''to grow the topline at the expense
of the bottomline''. |
WIPRO HEALTHCARE & LIFE SCIENCES |
N.A. |
From
software-based bioinfomatics that can help pharmaceutical companies
accelerate the drug discovery process to engineering services
that will help design medical equipment, Wipro Healthcare's
canvas is vast. ''We will grow both organically and inorganically,''
says Wipro Ltd Vice Chairman and Wipro Healthcare and Life Sciences
President D.A. Prasanna. |
WIPRO CONSUMER CARE & LIGHTING |
9% |
For
a taste of the original Wipro Ltd, look no farther than its
oldest business, consumer care. Detractors may wonder what Wipro
is still doing in this business, but as Wipro Ltd Vice Chairman
and Wipro Consumer Care & Lighting President P.S. Pai explains,
it provided the funds for Wipro's diversification into hardware
and software services. It also boasts ''operating margins of
14-15 per cent'', and may see fresh investments. |
ALL ABOUT
IDEAS
Wipro Ltd has an innovation framework that could
put 3M's fabled skunkworks to shame. Now for the results.
|
VINEET AGRAWAL, EXEC. VP, WIPRO: Playing
chief ideator |
A dedicated team
of 200, six projects, likely to increase, and a target of 20 per
cent contribution to revenues in three years-that's a snapshot of
Wipro's innovation effort. In 2000, when the company was done with
its efforts at branding and quality (for some time) it set its sights
on innovation, on creating products that could, as Chairman and
Managing Director Azim Premji puts it, ''be game changers.'' Vineet
Agrawal (his card reads Corporate Executive Vice President. Mission:
Quality, Brand & Innovation, Corporate Communication) was vested
with the task of identifying a structured framework for innovation
in keeping with the company's process-heavy approach to all things.
Agrawal started off by studying how organisations like Nike, Nokia,
and Home Depot tackle innovation; he spoke to consultants, academics,
and members of Wipro's board of directors, such as Ashok Ganguly,
formerly the head of R&D for Unilever and management guru Jagdish
Seth. Then, in part synthesis, in part, well, innovative, he created
a unique-to-Wipro methodology that could capture ideas and take
them to their logical denouement: revenues and profits, not just
IP (intellectual property) and products. The results are showing:
the company has customer orders in hand for four of the six projects.
''It is a big challenge to translate technology into customer needs,''
says Agrawal. Judging from those orders, he's doing just fine.
BREAD-AND-BUTTER
VS TOPPINGS
In 2001-02, enterprise
solutions accounted for 50 per cent of Wipro Technologies' business,
telecom and inter-networking, 23 per cent. The division has ambitious
plans for both.
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S. BANERJEE: Heading the consulting
thrust |
A.L. RAO: Banking on a telecom
revival |
Both are old-timers.
And both their business cards read President, Wipro Technologies.
The similarity ends there. Sudip Banerjee has been with Wipro 19
years, heads the Enterprise Solutions practice of the division,
works out of a 25-acre campus in Bangalore's Electronics City-the
Infosys campus is a stone's throw away and Banerjee personally oversaw
(and continues to oversee) the construction-and is now spearheading
the company's foray into it consulting, a logical next step for
the enterprise solutions practice. ''The enterprise will always
be at the heart of it because companies will have to maintain their
competitiveness; (they will) want to be at the cutting edge,'' says
Banerjee. Dr A.L. Rao has been with Wipro 22 years, heads the Telecom
and Inter-networking Practice of the division (the second largest
after Enterprise Solutions), works out of a matchbox-like vertically-scaled
building in Koramangala, and is hoping for an upswing in the telecommunications
sector. ''We work with almost all equipment manufacturers except
Siemens,'' says Rao, ''and once the sector's fortunes look up...''
HANDS-OFF, YET HANDS-ON
Contrary to popular perception, Premji is a
leader open to delegating power.
He's
paranoid about security-Wipro's Doddakannelli facility has electric
fencing around it-and sits alone on the third floor of one of the
buildings in the campus. That goes well with the image of an owner-manager.
But while he may not be quite as accessible as Infosys Chairman
N.R. Narayanamurthy-so says one individual who has worked with both-he
is quite the hands-off manager. "Premji empowers his people;
his biggest asset is his ability to take criticism," says Dilip
Ranjekar, CEO of the Azim Premji Foundation. Vice Chairman P.S.
Pai recalls a meeting where Premji was digressing from the agenda.
"I walked out in a huff and he took it," he grins. Like
most company-founders Premji values loyalty; most of his senior
team has been around for some time. Pai for 23 years, Vice Chairman
D.A. Prasanna for 24 years, and CFO Suresh Senapathy for 22. Pai
puts that down to the degree of empowerment in the organisation.
"You won't believe how empowered Wipro is," adds Vice
Chairman Vivek Paul. That's just the way Premji, who views Wipro
as a professional, not family-managed company, would have it. Neither
of his two sons is in business and when and if they do enter the
business-elder son Rashab works for GE Capital in New York, younger
son Tariq for 24/7customer.com-they will have to go through the
grind. ''The worst thing you can do to the investor community, and
that includes me,'' says Premji with a laugh, ''is to get the wrong
person into a leadership role.''
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