India Profile: Tech Mahindra

Gagandeep Kaur

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Before the revolution that made the Indian telecom market one of the world's largest, Tech Mahindra
Ltd. was a global company based in India, rather than an Indian company catering to the global market.

But that's more to do with its roots than with the gestation period of the Indian mobile sector.

Founded in 1986, the company was initially formed as a joint venture between Mahindra & Mahindra
and BT Group plc (NYSE: BT; London: BTA) under the name Mahindra-British Telecom, and, from the
beginning, had a dual focus on IT as well as network services, making it one of the pioneers of the
Service Provider Information Technology (SPIT) sector.

Even today, Tech Mahindra, which adopted its current name in early 2006, believes this is a mix that
differentiates it from its rivals.

"We are focused, not just on IT, but on the network side as well," says senior VP Soumitra (Raju)
Wadalkar, who heads the company's network-focused unit. "We have a large network practice…
network and OSS together. So we can provide an end-to-end network, as well as IT outsourcing," boasts
Wadalkar. The company also recently opened a next-generation network interoperability test lab in
Bangalore.

So, for example, the company has a five-year, $700 million deal with BT to help the British carrier
develop its IT, OSS, and applications management capabilities for its ongoing 21CN transformation
program, and is trying to take the skills it has developed from such projects in Europe and North
America, where it generates most of its business, into the broad Asia/Pacific market.

And now, with business opportunities in its home market growing, the company has a separate unit
(formed in 2009) dedicated to promoting that IT/networks combination to its domestic market.

The vast majority of Tech Mahindra's revenues, which totaled 46.25 billion Indian rupees (US$1.03
billion) in the year to March 31 2010, still comes from international markets – with BT still a major
source of its income -- but domestic revenues should be a greater contributor to the top line in the
coming years as it boosts its presence at home.
Table 1: Tech Mahindra Sheet

Company name Tech Mahindra Ltd.

Location Pune, Maharashtra
Founded 1986
Key executives Vineet Nayyar, Vice Chairman & Managing Director; Sanjay Kalra, CEO; L.
Ravichandran, Executive Vice President and COO
Headcount and 33,500 staff, operations in 25 countries with 16 regional offices worldwide
locations
Company focus IT services, communication network services
Revenues US1.03 billion in the financial year to March 31, 2010
Profitability $155.2 million in the financial year to March 31, 2010
Headline customers BT, AT&T, Etisalat DB
Main competitors Infosys, Wipro

"Apart from BT, the largest contract we closed was in India," says Wadalkar, referring to a 10-year deal
to support newcomer Etisalat DB India with network and IT services in a deal valued at INR20 billion
($444 million).

The company's global relationships and its standing in the international marketplace also appear to be
helping it build in the Indian market. Tech Mahindra is believed to have a strong working relationship
with Etisalat in the Middle East, while other key customers in India, Sistema Shyam TeleServices Ltd. and
S Tel Pvt. Ltd. , also have overseas parents in Sistema JSFC (London: SSA) and Bahrain
Telecommunications Co. (Batelco) , respectively.

Even so, Tech Mahindra isn't planning to grab every domestic deal that's available. In fact, Rajesh
Bhimsen Chandiramani, VP of sales and marketing, and head of the Indian business, doesn't expect local
deals to generate much more than 6 to 7 percent of the company's annual revenues. "We consciously
walked away from some of the deals in the Indian market, even though we did bid for all for them," says
Chandiramani, though he declined to identify the deals that Tech Mahindra rejected. Chandiramani did,
though, say that the overall size of the deals, and the parentage, are factors that are always considered.

In the current year, the network side of Tech Mahindra's business is set to focus on media hubs, content
delivery networks, and service delivery platforms. In addition, the company will "also be focusing on the
enterprise segment, which is a little weak in India," says Wadalkar. "Outside India we're doing a lot of
work with the operators to service their enterprise customers, so we can bring that knowledge into India
and help the operators service their enterprise customers much better." That's a focus that should be
helped by Tech Mahindra's integration with Satyam following last year's acquisition.

— Gagandeep Kaur, India Editor, Light Reading