The country's largest software services firm Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) on Thursday reported its first-quarter net profit at Rs 7,008 crore versus a CNBC-TV18 poll of Rs 7,690 crore and Rs 8,049 crore in the previous quarter. The company reported its first-quarter revenue at Rs 38,322 core versus an expectation of Rs 38,795 crore. This is a slip of four percent when compared to the last quarter.

The earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) has been reported at Rs 9,048 crore versus Rs 10,025 crore in the fourth quarter and this is a fall of 9.4 percent. The EBIT margin has come in at 23.61 percent versus 25.10 percent in the previous quarter.

The constant currency revenue growth has also slipped to -6.9 percent versus a CNBC-TV18 Poll of -5.1 percent.

Globally, businesses have been impacted by COVID-19 pandemic. While Indian IT firms had seen some impact in March, this is the first full quarter factoring in the impact of disruption and lockdowns in various parts of the world, including India.

"The revenue impact of the pandemic played out broadly along the lines we had anticipated at the start of the quarter. It affected all verticals, with the exception of Life Sciences and Healthcare, with varying levels of impact," TCS CEO and MD Rajesh Gopinathan said.

He said the company believes the impact has "bottomed out" and that TCS should now start tracing its path to growth.

After an initial period of disruption, customers have now stabilised their operations, and the company is seeing many customers focus on front-end transformation, resulting in significant traction for its products and services, he noted.

"The other big investment themes are around driving operational resilience, adaptability, and optimisation. We signed several large core transformation programs encompassing operations, applications, cloud, and cybersecurity," he said.

The company said despite the continued uncertainty and weakness in all major economies, it has had very healthy deal closures and a strong pipeline.

At the beginning of the first quarter, TCS had said it expects recovery from the third quarter of FY21.

First Published:Jul 9, 2020 6:18 PM IST