New Delhi, Oct. 21: HCL Technologies, the country's fourth-largest IT company, today reported a 16.7 per cent jump in its September-quarter net profit and has expressed optimism on growth in the coming quarters amid a "softness" in client spending.
The IT company has also announced that it has elevated its chief operating officer C. Vijayakumar as the new CEO, following the departure of Anant Gupta.
"Anant Gupta has decided to leave the company to pursue personal interests outside of HCL," it said in a statement.
HCL Technologies' profit during the quarter grew to Rs 2,014 crore from Rs 1,726 crore a year ago. Revenues were up 14 per cent at Rs 11,519 crore, according to the US GAAP accounting norms.
The company has maintained its revenue growth guidance at 12-14 per cent for 2016-17 on a constant currency basis.
"I do agree that some of the traditional discretionary spends are a little bit soft, but they are being more than offset by disruptive discretionary spends. So, we remain very optimistic about our growth," Vijayakumar said.
Rivals TCS and Infosys had posted muted figures and admitted that they witnessed softness in the banking and financial services sector and client spending.
In constant currency terms, revenues were up 12.8 per cent year-on-year.
The results were more or less in line with expectations," said Sarabjit Kour Nangra, vice-president (research-IT) at Angel Broking.
However, net profit fell 1.6 per cent from Rs 2,047 crore during April-June 2016 impacted by wage hikes. In dollar terms, net profit grew 14.2 per cent to $301.2 million, while revenues rose 11.5 per cent to $1.72 billion over the year-ago period.
Reacting to the results, the company's scrip closed higher by 1.94 per cent at Rs 831.05 on the BSE.
The company has announced a dividend of Rs 6 per share. During the quarter, HCL Tech added 9,083 people (gross), taking the total headcount to 1,09,795 as on September 30, 2016. Attrition in IT services (last 12-month basis) stood at 18.6 per cent.
The company's cash and cash equivalents stood at Rs 1,242.8 crore at the end of September 30, 2016.
Besides, it announced the acquisition of Butler America Aerospace for $85 million in cash. The buyout will strengthen its position in the aerospace and defence engineering services space.
