Growth is like a cricket match, every phase is different
Rajesh Gopinathan, CEO, TCS
Jul 13, 2018 | Source: ET Bureau

In the medium term, the growth is definitely sustainable as it is broad based across verticals and geographies. North America and BFSI — two large segments for us — are turning around; this is where the optimism is coming from. There is definite visibility into the next quarter and we will see how the holiday season pans out. One-off events or economic turmoil can derail it. Retail is still a bit weak and I wouldn’t rule out a bankruptcy of some company there.
A 44% growth in digital revenues also caught us by surprise. We grew better than 30% last financial year. We are confident of doing 30% again in FY19. It will moderate as size increases. While we break up service lines as digital and non-digital, contracts don’t, they are a composite of the two. There is still legacy procurement happening. Digital comes in at a better price point but also has different challenges from a delivery perspective. The challenges here are different- It is like a cricket match, every phase is different. We have done well in the consolidation phase; the opportunity now is to use the platform to accelerate. We have built up a good base.
It is a vindication of our capability and strategy. A year or two ago the general perception in the industry was that we (TCS) better acquire capabilities, talent and new customers to grow; we doubled down on our talent. This quarter’s (performance) is a vindication of our strategy. We are now on a good trajectory for fiscal 2019. Our senior-most people have the bandwidth to plan the next phase of growth. An inorganic strategy is a means to accelerate what we have rather than a bandaid for what we don’t have. We now have more time to look at inorganic growth seriously given that our core is in a strong place.
Cloud, agile and automation are three big technology themes that we have been speaking of, so far. Our approach to automation is traditional, it is not about what the machine can do for you, it is about what you can do with the machine. The initial focus of digital was the novelty of experience. But, the benefit comes from how it is integrated with the enterprise.
Likewise, for business to benefit from automation, there must be integration. So the machine-first delivery model is TCS’ approach of integrating automation into the basics of how enterprise technology is delivered. We are staying away from headline grabbing stuff like — can we play chess on a machine? That doesn’t deliver value to an enterprise, the value comes from more predictable operations. Think about machine-first delivery as the next decade phenomenon, like global network delivery model was for the last two decades.
In fact, all of the rules going back to Y2K days, system integration and system’s software DNA that we have built are coming into play in machine-first delivery model (MFDM). While we will talk more about Ignio next month when we celebrate its third anniversary, but you will find very old TCS DNA rooted in here. It is old stuff, it is the stuff that we have invested in the last two decades, packaging in different forms and integrating it. We are creating a playbook on how enterprises can use automation into their service delivery. So we are taking it out of TCS and making it available for our customers to consume it.
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