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Bangalore , Dec 16

WIPRO has remained non-committal about the extent and impact of the Lehman Bros decision to take helpdesk work back home.

In what is seen as another sign of the backlash against outsourcing in the Western markets, Lehman Bros is reported to have stopped outsourcing its IT helpdesk - which handles employee reports of computer problems - to Wipro.

"We do not comment on individual client relationships without their approval,'' said a Wipro spokesperson. According to Mr K.R. Laxminarayan, Corporate Treasurer and in-charge of customer relations, "We have a strong relationship with Lehman Bros and have been doing work for them in multiple areas. This (BPO) is a small part of the whole relationship,'' he said.

The New York-based financial services firm last year hired Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and Wipro in a $70-million deal, one of the biggest deals to come to Indian companies for its information technology operations. A Dow Jones report cites Lehman's dissatisfaction with the level of services as the reason for stopping the helpdesk work six weeks ago.

"With reference to news reports in certain sections of the media on Lehman Brothers Holdings, TCS reiterates that it continues to do work with Lehman Brothers and the decision by Lehman Brothers, as reported in the media, does not impact the TCS-Lehman engagement in any manner,'' said Mr Atul Takle, Vice-President, Corporate Communications, TCS, in a press statement.

Wipro declined to comment on the outsourcing backlash "at this time'', but said that its sentiments on the issue were unchanged. In earlier comments, Wipro top brass had said that while the company understood and respected the sentiment behind the backlash, as long as Indian companies retained their competitive edge, outsourcing was inevitable.

"Wipro continues to work to make people understand that outsourcing is not the villain of the piece but that the issues at hand are in retraining and re-skilling of workers,'' said a Wipro spokesperson.

Analysts had estimated that the offshore development centre by Wipro for Lehman Brothers had a revenue potential of $30-35 million.

Sources say Wipro has been doing application development and infrastructure maintenance apart from the BPO work for the customer and that the BPO is one part of the total work outsourced.

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Lehman Bros' decision to stop outsourcing IT helpdesk — Wipro, TCS downplay impact

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