TCS opts for dedicated solution centres

26 May 2006

Chennai: Hard on the heels of bagging its largest client order of $500 million in the financial services vertical, Asia''s largest software company Tata Consultancy Services Limited (TCS) has launched its exclusive banking and financial services centre at Chennai.

The mega order will be spread over five years and will have the team from the new centre working on its implementation. The banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI) vertical contributes 42 per cent of TCS'' revenues.

TCS expects similar-sized orders in the future, based on its request for proposals, though company officials reiterated that they would continue to have a judicious mix of big and small orders in the BFSI segment. TCS also has a good domestic presence in this segment.

Says Ravi Vishwanathan, vice president and head, Chennai operations, TCS, "Chennai will continue to be an arrowhead for growth for TCS, with key investments coming into the place." Currently Chennai has 15,000 employees working in core verticals such as BFSI, telecom, retail, travel and others.

TCS itself is realigning itself around such dedicated solution centres to provide better delivery to clients - such centres will be enable to handle the whole gamut of IT requirement from concept / consultancy through implementation / maintenance and business process outsourcing (BPO). Already the company has a dedicated solutions centre for insurance and infrastructure solutions.

While Chennai and Bangalore will continue to handle the BFSI clients, TCS Chennai will focus more on the financial services. "But core verticals will have satellite centres supporting them from other places including overseas - locational support is also needed,'''' says Vishwanathan. The company would be adding 1,740 heads this fiscal for the BFSI vertical. Currently the company has 3,200 people working in the BFSI projects with 1,200 from abroad.