TCS beats market estimates

Q4 net zooms 73% to Rs 6,413 cr, revenue up 17.5% to `28,449 crore

Mumbai : The country's largest software exporter TCS on Monday reported a stellar 72.7 per cent growth in net profit at Rs 6,413 crore for the fourth quarter of last fiscal ended March 31. The company had reported net profit of Rs 3,713 crore in the same period of last fiscal as per IGAAP accounting norms.

The Tata Group company, which chips in with more than 60 per cent of the group's overall profit, reported a revenue growth of 17.5 per cent at Rs 28,449 crore for the last quarter of 2015-16, up from Rs 24,220 crore a year ago.

"Our core portfolio performed strongly in a seasonally weak fourth quarter driven by strong volumes led by growth in BFSI, retail and manufacturing sectors. This gives us good momentum going into the new financial year," said N Chandrasekaran, CEO and MD, TCS.

Investments in building high impact digital platforms are paying off, resulting in over $2.3 billion in digital revenues, he added. Digital space accounted for 15.5 per cent of the quarter's revenues. For the entire 2015-16, TCS saw net profit growing 22.4 per cent to Rs 24,292 crore, while revenue was up 14.8 per cent to Rs 1,08,646 crore.

During the January-March quarter, TCS added 22,576 employees (gross), while on a net basis the addition was 9,152, taking the overall employee strength to close to 3,53,843. "TCS completed its highest ever hiring of over 90,000 new employees globally during the year. We are also delighted that our employee retention continues to increase," said Ajoy Mukherjee, Executive vice president and Global Head- HR, TCS. Attrition rate was at 15.5 per cent LTM basis.

"We are building the right talent pool by training more than 120,000 TCSers in FY16 in over 400 new digital technologies to help our customers drive adoption of digital in their enterprise," he said. Chandrasekaran added that the company will continue to invest in developing digital talent and launch new products in emerging areas, leveraging the Internet of Things, automation and machine learning.

TCS CFO Rajesh Gopinathan said the company invested over $250 million to support organic growth in its digital businesses and in new markets, while maintaining profitability within the desired range and generated strong operating cash flows as well.

The fourth quarter saw broad-based growth for the company with the core portfolio performing strongly led by BFSI (3.2 per cent sequential growth), manufacturing (3.9 per cent quarter-on- quarter) and retail (2.1 per cent q-o-q) in constant currency. For 2015-16, growth was led by BFS (14.8 per cent year-on- year), life sciences (20.6 pc), travel & hospitality (17 pc) and manufacturing (15 pc) in constant currency.

In terms of key markets, growth in the fourth quarter was led by Europe (3.6 per cent q-o-q) and North America (2.4 pc) in constant currency. For the entire last fiscal, North America grew by 10.8 per cent, Europe (12.9 pc), UK (8.3 pc) in constant currency. Its annual revenue from India crossed $1 billion milestone, while overall revenues from new growth markets stood at $3.3 billion in FY16.