Infosys Aims to Become a $20 Billion Company by 2020

Information technology bellwether Infosys Ltd is targeting to become a $20 billion (roughly Rs. 1,27,558 crores) revenue company by 2020 with an average revenue per employee at $80,000, said a top company official near Chennai on Friday.

Speaking to reporters, Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director Vishal Sikka said: "It is an aspirational goal. We use that to organise our thoughts. I believe we can get there."

According to him, the goal would be achieved by a mix of organic and inorganic growth.

Queried about how realistic was the goal of average revenue per employee growing up to $80,000 (roughly Rs. 50.4 lakhs) from the current $50,000 (roughly Rs. 31.5 lakhs), he said many of the routine works would be automated and more number of employees would be deployed in such work that would fetch higher revenue.

He said an additional head count of 70,000 would be added to the company rolls in the process towards achieving the five-year goal.

Sikka said that by 2020 the company would have around 250,000 employees.

Queried about the fourth quarter and the annual results for 2014-15, Sikka said his philosophy is not to worry about transient things like quarterly growth but to look at annual numbers.

Infosys reported net profit of Rs. 3,097 crore for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2014-15 with a 3.5 percent growth over the corresponding period the previous year.

The company posted a revenue of Rs. 13,411 crore for the period under review, up by 4.2 percent over the previous year.

According to Infosys, the revenues are expected to grow 8.4-10.4 percent in Indian rupee terms.

For the full year, the company posted a consolidated revenue of Rs. 53,319 crore, logging an year-on-year growth of 6.4 percent.

The net profit stood at Rs. 12,329 crore, up by 15.8 percent.

The company has given a guidance of 10-12 percent growth in constant currency terms for the current fiscal.

The company also announced a definitive agreement to acquire around 500 employees Kallidus Inc, and its affiliate, a leading provider of digital experience solutions, including mobile commerce and in-store shopping experiences to large retail clients.

Infosys also said it has entered into an agreement for an early state investment of $2 million (roughly Rs. 12 crores) in Airviz to acquire minority stake.

Airviz is a personal air quality monitoring start-up and spinout from Carnegie Mellon University.

Infosys recently completed the acquisition of Panaya, a provider of automation technology.

According to the company, its liquid assets stood at Rs. 32,585 crore as on March 31, 2015 as compared to Rs. 34,873 crore as on December 31, 2014 and Rs. 30,251 crore as on March 31, 2014.

The company board that met near Chennai on Friday recommended a bonus issue of one equity share for every equity share held and a stock dividend of one American Depositary Share (ADS) for every ADS held as on a record date to be determined.

The Board recommended a final dividend of Rs. 29.50 share per share for fiscal 2015 (equivalent to Rs. 14.75 per share after 1:1 bonus issue).

The board decided to hike the dividend pay-out ratio to up to 50 percent of post tax profits effective from fiscal 2015 -- from 40 percent.

During the year, the gross employee additions were over 50,000 while the quarterly annualized attrition declined to 13.4 percent.

"Services growth in the fourth quarter was lower than we expected though we saw healthy growth in Financle and our Edge suite.

Pricing continues to be under pressure due to increasing commoditisation in the traditional outsourcing business, requiring us to ramp up productivity through automation and enhance our differentiation in large engagements," U.B. Pravin Rao, chief operating officer was quoted as saying in the statement.

Meanwhile investors gave a thumbs down for the company stock. The scrip after opening at Rs. 2,135 at the NSE closed at Rs. 1,995.20 down from Rs. 2,122 the closing price on Thursday.