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.