News Hour- HCL Tech Q2 profit rises 43 pct, eyes global contracts

BANGALORE (Reuters) - HCL Technologies(:HCLT.NSHCLT.NS), India's No. 4 software services provider, is looking to grab a slice of $47 billion worth of global contracts up for renewal in 2012, as customers seek new approaches to navigate the global economic slowdown.

"A lot of churn is happening in the Global 500 customer base," Chief Executive Officer Vineet Nayar said at a conference, after the company's fiscal second-quarter profit rose 43.3 percent.

"They are seeking new vendors with new ideas, new propositions, with new way of approaching a problem, and that newness is opening the market space as never before."

The contracts up for renewal are spread across 249 customers, with the likelihood that as many as a third of those might go to new vendors, Nayar said.

"It represents a $15 billion opportunity."

Bigger rival Infosys (NSE:INFY.NS - NewsINFY.NS) last week lowered its annual revenue-growth outlook for a second time and warned of lower client spending due to the euro zone debt crisis.Nayar, however feels, that "while the recessionary trend might be a threat for a lot of IT vendors across the world, we see that as a tremendous opportunity, because lots of bets are off."

SHARES RISE

HCL Tech's consolidated net profit rose to 5.73 billion rupees for its fiscal second quarter ended December 31 from almost 4 billion rupees a year earlier, driving its shares up more than 6.5 percent.

HCL, part of India's $76 billion software industry that predominantly serves customers in the United States and Europe, won 18 multi-year, multi-million dollar deals in the December quarter, excluding contract renewals, the company said.

It added 2,556 employees in the quarter, it said.

"HCL continues to increase its market share both qualitatively and quantitatively by leveraging its multi-service capability," Nayar said in a statement.

Business from two of the company's top 10 clients would be more than $100 million a year, he said.

"Over the years, they have struck some very large transformational deals," said P Phani Sekhar, a fund manager with the Portfolio Management Service of Angel Broking Ltd.

"As some of HCL's contracts come up for renewal, we should see how they stack up," he said.

Shares in HCL, which has a market value of $5.4 billion, were up 5.6 percent at 428.80 rupees at 1:30 p.m. after rising as high as 432.50 rupees, in a Mumbai market up 1.7 percent.

(Source- http://in.finance.yahoo.com)