Wipro Q1 net profit up 12.5% at Rs 2,387.6 cr; sees up to 2% sequential revenue growth in Q2

New Delhi: IT major Wipro Ltd on Wednesday posted a 12.5 percent rise in consolidated net profit at Rs 2,387.6 crore for the April-June quarter, and guided for up to 2 percent sequential revenue growth for the July-September period. Its revenue increased by about 5.3 percent to Rs 14,716.1 crore during the reported quarter, compared to Rs 13,977.7 crore in the year-ago period. The Bengaluru-based company’s consolidated income rose by about 5 percent to Rs 15,566.6 crore during the reported quarter. Wipro’s mainstay IT services revenue was $2,038.8 million, up 4.3 percent year-on-year. The company, which competes with rivals like Tata Consultancy Services and Infosys, had earlier said its IT services revenues in June 2019 quarter are likely to be in the range of $2,046 million to $2,087 million, excluding the impact of the divestment of its Workday and Cornerstone On Demand business. [caption id=“attachment_4589811” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] File photo of Abidali Neemuchwala, CEO, Wipro. Reuters[/caption] For the July-September quarter, Wipro expects its IT services revenue to be in the range of $2,039 million to $2,080 million – translating into a sequential growth of up to 2 percent. “We delivered IT services margins of 18.4 percent and free cash flows of 98.8 percent of our net income. We had a slower start to the year, we, however, remain focused on our operations and continue to invest in talent and capabilities for the future,” Wipro Chief Financial Officer Jatin Dalal said. Wipro saw a sequential drop of 3.8 percent in net profit from Rs 2,483.5 crore in March 2019 quarter, while revenue dropped 1.9 percent from Rs 15,006.3 crore in the previous quarter. “Our efforts on client mining have resulted in an addition of three customers in more than $100 million bucket. We will continue to build differentiated capabilities to drive business transformation for our customers by investing in our big bets,” Wipro CEO and Executive Director Abidali Z Neemuchwala said. Wipro’s topline numbers lag behind those of larger rivals TCS and Infosys that announced their first-quarter performance last week. TCS logged a revenue growth of 11.4 percent to Rs 38,172 crore during the June quarter, while Infosys saw its topline rising 14 percent to Rs 21,803 crore. HCL Technologies, which overtook Wipro to become the third-largest Indian IT services company, is yet to announce its quarterly results. Wipro’s earnings per share (EPS) for the June quarter was at Rs 3.97 per share, up 12.5 percent from the previous year. The company said it will complete its previously announced its Rs 10,500 crore buyback proposal of up to 323.1 million equity shares (at a price of Rs 325 apiece) after receiving approval from market regulator SEBI. Wipro’s IT products segment reported revenue of Rs 240 crore, while that of its India state-run enterprises (SRE) segment was about Rs 210 crore.