The Hindu Business Line : HCL Tech to buy UK firm

New Delhi, July 16 HCL Technologies on Wednesday announced the acquisition of Liberata Financial Services (LFS), a UK-based BPO provider and subsidiary of Liberata Ltd, for a consideration of $2 million for value of assets.

HCL Technologies also plans to invest $24 million over the next three years to grow the business and for development of technology platforms.

LFS, regulated in the UK by Financial Services Authority (FSA), provides administrative and customer services for the life and pensions industry. As part of the transaction, HCL Tech would acquire four delivery centres in the UK with 800 professionals who come with domain knowledge and technical expertise. “The revenue of the company is pegged at $60 million, where as the order book of LFS is close to $540 million,” Mr Anil Chanana, Executive Vice-President - Finance of HCL Technologies, told reporters.

All-cash deal

LFS has multi-year contracts with its customers which includes blue chip names. “The company has six major clients. The processes currently undertaken by LFS include claims settlement in life insurance policies, actuarial services and analytics in pensions,” he said adding that it was an all-cash deal.

In a statement , HCL Tech said its insurance practice would be strengthened by LFS’s core capability to manage complex transactions.