Mahindra Satyam will look at re-listing its shares on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) during the next fiscal, a top company official said.

“Listing is important from a sentiment point of view…it gives us the last bit of credibility. But it is not a customer requirement since our customer base is intact. Hopefully, we will be able to relist in 2011-12. NYSE listing will happen as soon as the US GAAP accounts are ready,” Mr C.P. Gurnani, CEO of Mahindra Satyam, said on the sidelines of Nasscom's India leadership Forum event here.

Mahindra Satyam's American Depository Receipts were transferred from the NYSE to the over-the-counter market in mid-October 2010 after it missed a deadline to file restated financial results under US accounting standards. The global demand for IT services continues to be strong despite the debt crisis in Europe and the nervousness in the US over job losses. “The appetite for Indian IT vendors, the likes of Mahindra Satyam, continues to be high (amongst clients),” he said.

Small deals

However, the market is throwing up more of small and medium outsourcing opportunities, than large deals, he said. “We are not seeing a lot of large deals, say those over $100 million. Most of the deals are up to $90 million in size,” he said.

He said that growth was seen across markets and service offerings, particularly areas such as enterprise mobility and business platforms. “The focus is completely on outcome-based pricing and not FTE pricing,” he said.

Mr Gurnani further said that there was no visibility yet on the ramifications of Egypt crisis. “There is nervousness about Middle East and Egypt. It will be sometime before the industry gets to know the real impact,” he said.

On tech spends, he said that the IT budgets were coming down, but added that it would, in turn, spur opportunity for Indian vendors. “The dollar spending is coming down. The global CIO, who is now focused on operational efficiency, needs to deliver more with less,” he said.

But discretionary spends are on the rise, as companies look to launch newer businesses, increase service offerings and enhance international footprint.

New Biz environment

Asked about his views on the new business environment triggering a top deck reshuffle among larger rivals, Mr Gurnani said, “The industry is very dynamic, and you are not responding to the market if you say that you are not changing.”

The company (formerly Satyam Computer) — which was hit by a mega accounting fraud by its founder two years ago and was subsequently bought over by Mahindra — reported a net profit of Rs 23.3 crore for September quarter against Rs 97.5 crore in the preceding quarter. It reported revenues of Rs 1,242 crore in the second quarter, marginally lower than Rs 1,248 crore in the preceding quarter. The company had attributed the drop in net profit to rising employee costs. For the year ended 2009-10, it ended up with loss of Rs 124.60 crore.

>moumita@thehindu.co.in

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