Source: economictimes.indiatimes.com

MUMBAI: Outsourcing player Accentia Technologies is planning to increase its headcount to 5,500 by the end of the current fiscal to meet its business requirements.

We are enlarging our manpower base to meet the increasing order book pipe-line, besides catering to the existing customers, CEO and Director Accentia Technologies Pradeep Viswambharam said.

In line with its plans, the company has acquired 51 per cent stake in US-based Oak Technologies Inc (OTI) in an all cash deal. However, the financial details of the transaction were not disclosed by the company.

Oak Technologies has five units operational in the US and India, Accentia said in a stock market filing.

“Through the acquisition, Accentia has put in place the internal accruals in a synergistic operational investment,” Viswambharam said. The acquisition has added 700 personnels to its workforce.

Accentia plans to build on its acquired OTI base through aggressive HR development over the next two years.

“OTI has its presence in Hyderabad, Nagpur and Bhubaneswar. Accentia plans to add about 2,000 personnel in these locations,” Viswambharam added.

Shares of Accentia closed at Rs 140.05, down 2.23 per cent on the BSE.

Source: www.financialexpress.com

Chennai, Mar 31 Wipro Technologies, the gloabl IT services business of Wipro Ltd, is expanding its operartions here by setting up new facilites for 35,000 employees over the next five years. The company is setting up an 80-acre new facility at Sholinganallur-Elcot Special Economic Zone (SEZ) and in a 90-acre facility at the Mahindra City SEZ to augment the business growth in the next five years, Sudip Banerjee, president, enterprise solutions, Wipro Technologies, said here on Monday.

The company currently has 2,500 seats at the facility and expected to increase it by 5,000 to 7,000 this year, he said.

Manpower availability from campuses and of domain experts from various manufacturing and service industries through lateral entry was a major attraction in Tamil Nadu, he said.

Wipro has to expand in its key IT hubs like Chennai to sustain its growth in all verticals and key segments.

The company has 12,000 employees and six offices in Chennai to service its customers in various industries like telecom, automobile, banking enterprise, manufacturing, retail, travel, media, technology and transportation, Chandrasekhar Dharuman vice-president and Chennai centre head said.

He said besides having centres of excellence (CoE), there were teams in broadband, retail, banking, wrieless and consumer electronics. A Japnese competency lab and a global command centre to support multiple customers through a unified service desk were also operational in Chennai.

Wipro has a business process outsourcing centre (BPO) here employing 2500 people.

Wipro has about 4000 employees in overseas centres in Europe, the US, Canada, Latin America, China and Japan.

It provides comprehensive research and development services, IT solutions and services including system integration, information systems outsourcing, package implementations, software application development, and maintenence services to corporations the world over.

Source: www.eweek.com
In a three-part outsourcing deal valued at more than $4 billion, Shell expects to keep layoffs to a minimum.

In one of the biggest outsourcing deals in the last five years, Royal Dutch Shell announced March 31 that it will be farming out its technology and telecommunications infrastructure through three deals valued together at more than $4 billion.

AT&T, T-Systems and EDS were the winners of the five-year contracts, with a $1.6 billion networking and telecommunications piece going to AT&T; a $1 billion hosting and storage deal going to T-Systems, a subsidiary of Deutsche Telekom and a $1 billion computing services and operational integration piece to EDS.

Most of the agreements will go into effect on July 1, when the vast majority of Shell’s IT staff will be transferred to the service providers. The company anticipates minimal redundancies.

Shell’s IT organization provides IT services to approximately 150,000 users in 100 countries. Of the 3,600 staff and third-party contractors in the outsourced Infrastructure division, which are concentrated in the Netherlands, UK, Malaysia and Houston, 3,000 will be transferred to the suppliers, according to the press release.

The remaining 600 IT infrastructure employers will be retained by Shell.

As part of its $1.6 billion piece, approximately 560 Shell employees will be joining AT&T’s worldwide work force of 300,000. About 1,500 of Shell’s IT employees will head to EDS as part of their $1 billion deal, and 900 Shell IT professionals will join T-Systems’ ranks.

“Partnering with EDS, T-Systems and AT&T gives us greater ability to respond to the growing demands of our businesses. It allows Shell IT to focus on Information Technology that drives competitive position in the oil & gas market, whilst suppliers focus on improving essential IT capability,” said Alan Matula, Shell’s CIO in a statement.