The COVID 19 pandemic has tested the resilience of many industries. If one goes by the earnings performance, the Indian IT industry has emerged stronger through the crisis.

TCS has seen its best third-quarter revenue growth in the last 9 years, while Infosys has delivered an 8-year high for the same quarter. Wipro's EBITDA margin has come in a 22-quarter high, while HCL Technologies has upgraded both its revenue and margin guidance while clocking $ 10 billion in revenue for 2020.

NASSCOM'S CEO survey for 2021-22 holds out confidence for the year ahead with 67 percent CEO's saying they expect the Indian tech industry to grow significantly higher than 2020.

So on day-two of NASSCOM’s Technology & Leadership Forum, which focuses on shaping the future towards a better normal, if the services model needs redefining and if yes, then what changes need to be made to adapt to the new opportunities.

To discuss this, CNBC-TV18’s Shereen Bhan spoke to the tech troika of the Indian IT industry, Salil Parekh, CEO of Infosys; Thierry Delaporte, MD & CEO of Wipro; and C Vijayakumar, President & CEO of HCL Technologies.

Salil Parekh said, “The thing that is really changing is all large enterprises are looking at digital and cloud transformation and that for us is the key that is driving all of these growths. What we see today for example in the last quarter we saw digital growing at over 30 percent and that is the critical element for us as we see the enterprises emerging through all over these changes."

"There is a lot of focus that our large clients are having on their end customers, on the employees, and on their supply chains. To make all of that enable in fact it in a way we are representing that digital enablement is what is driving the growth for us and I think for the IT services business overall.”

C Vijayakumar said, “We need to do a lot more about upskilling and bringing the latest technology focus among the whole education including the work-life that is one. Second, I also think diversity and inclusion is something which all of us are consciously trying to push the envelope but I think we still have a long way to go."

"The third element is the brand perception, even though the value that we add is significantly changed, the brand is still associated with talent and capabilities and skills. From there the brand perception needs to be changed to business outcomes and kind of reinventing different sectors. I would think these are the three things that we will need to do more work on.”

Thierry Delaporte said, “The pandemic has accelerated the situation to a point now where we do understand technology, we embrace technology, our people love technology. We are now in a world where technology is more important than ever, but what matters the most is business issues, understanding of these issues, and leveraging technology to address those business issues. That is how I see the evolution over the last years.”

For full interview, watch accompanying videos...

(Edited by : Bivekananda Biswas)

First Published:Feb 18, 2021 6:07 PM IST