Applying Thought

align="right" border="0" hspace="2" vspace="2"> color="#000000">Two years ago, Wipro Infotech shifted its headquar-ters from Mumbai to
Bangalore. Roughly around the same time, Bombay Club was making rather loud noises asking
for a 'level playing field.' Apocryphal, but the country's top hardware vendor would have
nothing to do with it. In its own inimitable way, Wipro has moved ahead, constantly
changing, constantly reinventing itself, constantly reorganizing...to meet the challenge
of being India's homegrown brand which is more known for its integrity and ethics than
hyperbole and decibel level. Along the way, Wipro has achieved several milestones, primary
amongst them being associated with the BSE automation project, being the first to launch a
shrink-wrapped product over a decade ago, power marketing a whole range of system brands
ranging from Sun to Tandem to Acer to Apple. Along the way, becoming the largest IT
company in last year's DQ Top 20 ranking.

One thing that Wipro has eschewed is the
race for numbers. Across the country, Wipro's customers and partners continue to lay a
heavy responsibility on the company's track record of ethical selling, avoiding the
'sell-and-run' tactic, striving to provide value rather than numbers. Also inimitable is
Wipro's track record of managing relationships in a highly changing, tumultuous IT
industry. Sun has been with Wipro for over 10 years, so has Tandem, so has Epson....
Besides performance, Wipro's strength is that it deeply understands the psyche of its
partners, be they customers, channels, or JV partners.

That has allowed Wipro to chart its own
course in the technology marketplace and has allowed the company's top management to look
for adding more value to its relationships. Never one to go by the past, Wipro has taken
some gutsy decisions on the way. The most recent example of such courage was the
jettisoning of the SuperGenius brand in favor of the Acer brand name and the subsequent
reversal of the decision two years later.

The Philosophy Of Thought

In a manner of speaking, Wipro's entire strategy is based upon this philosophy of
'Thought'. With a Group revenue which just crossed Rs 1,000 crore, Wipro is now embarking
on several new endeavors almost simultaneously. The first, and the one which occupies the
maximum mindshare, is the PC strategy. With a stated policy of pincering the market from
both the MNC brand end and the local brand end, Wipro is probably hoping that the earlier
confusion that the market had with respect to the positioning of the Wipro-Acer brand will
now go away. As a result, this will allow both the Acer and the Wipro brands to occupy
distinct slots in the volume market. One of the fallouts of this decision will also be to
see how aggressively Acer is positioned in the market and how much of a strength the brand
commands in the MNC brand category. While it is too early to say anything at this point in
time, the channels in Mumbai and Delhi appear to be more enthused about the future of the
Wipro brand name.

The second area of strategic import
for Wipro is enhancing its positioning in the global market. This part of the act is being
masterminded by Wipro's most well-known Technology Chief Manager, Sridhar Mitta. Operating
out of the US, Mitta's mandate will be to get the Softchips venture going and to post a
healthy return on development and sales. While this venture may not necessarily net a high
revenue for the Group in the current year, it will be critical as far as positioning Wipro
in the global hi-tech solution provider market is concerned. With an impressive track
record of design and development work already behind him, Softchips will be Mitta's way of
establishing Wipro's talent in this area. Depending upon the initial success, Wipro and
Mitta might well step on the gas in the Softchips venture in the next year.

The third area of focus will be to
concentrate on the domain expertise as well as horizontal markets. Spanning a wide
spectrum of domains, Wipro today has specific expertise in ecommerce, finance, healthcare,
supply chain, ERP, telecom, utilities, and retail businesses. Domestically, these are the
areas where the company will be focusing its talents on, apart form networking, which will
cut across the entire domain range. Internationally, Wipro will be on its feet impressing
upon these domain areas to put their energies on. For instance, it has established a
subsidiary in Chicago-Healthsys-to address the healthcare business in the US. In the
horizontal band, Wipro is zeroing in on Euro opportunities, Y2K, datawarehousing, and
ecommerce. With a majority of its overseas businesses flowing in from the US, Wipro is
also looking actively at opportunities in Europe and Japan. This, the company says, will
reduce its dependence on the US market for sales.

The Quality Movement

The backbone of all this frantic activity at Wipro is the quality movement that is going
on within the company. Wipro currently has over two dozen Six Sigma projects on ground.
The company is racing to meet its own deadline of Six Sigma by 2002. Chairman Azim Premji
downward, the entire company is moving as one to achieve this milestone. The company is
also planning to add another 1,800 people to its current roll of 6,952 people. Early this
fiscal, Wipro also unveiled its new logo, the rainbow-decked Sunflower, to provide a
common identity to all its stakeholders. Wipro plans to spend close to Rs 50 crore in the
current year to drive home the message of its new logo-which stands for youthful,
energetic, multifaceted, innovative, large, and diversified. Wipro clearly is moving
toward a scenario where a lion's share of its revenues come from international operations.
If that is to happen, then the quality religion at the company is extremely well-timed.

Another strength that Wipro has-and one
that will come to its aid-is its low attrition level. Compared to an industry average of
20-22 percent, Wipro is currently at 14 percent which, in a predatory market of today, is
pretty admirable. With a culture that is extremely employee-friendly, the low attrition
level will enable Wipro to marshal its resources for the global charge and create the next
generation of Wipro's managers.

Some issues will still remain. First, the
success of Wipro brand will be an acid test for the company. While the prognosis is good,
the proof of the concept will be known only after the first two quarters are out. Second,
while Wipro management is bullish about Acer, it is widely believed that the latter is
planning on opening its own office in India. It is all too possible for Acer to spread
itself out more by going multi-distribution for PCs. Third, in the hardware market, while
Wipro has a sure winner in Sun, the last year has been slow for all servers. That Sun was
able to hold its position is laudable. However, if the tough times continue, then the
domestic market, especially for hardware, will be under pressure, which will also tell on
Wipro. Its recent relationships with HP are likely to net good returns for the company,
while the casualty could be its existing relationship with Epson.

The ace that Wipro has is its management's
commitment to global quality. That being so, it is certain that Wipro will still be
reinventing itself as and when it needs to. For this veteran, the next avatar of a global
company has just begun.