Larsen & Toubro Infotech reported a 46.7 per cent rise in its net income in the quarter ended September 30 to ₹400 crore, driven by growth in high margin digital business.

Revenues grew 33.1 per cent for the quarter to ₹2,231 crore, compared to the same period last year. In dollar terms, the growth stood at 21.4 per cent.

Digital business contribution grew to 37 per cent of the overall revenues in the quarter, helping the L&T group company grow faster than its peers.

“The growth you’re seeing today has been many quarters in the making. Our quarter-on-quarter growth has helped in creating the momentum that we’re seeing,” Sanjay Jalona, Chief Executive Officer & Managing Director, LTI, told BusinessLine.

“The important part is being digital as a company now contributes 37 per cent to our revenues. This is the third quarter in a row that we’ve announced a deal worth $50-million plus. Such deals give us the momentum for the times to come. We need to keep winning these regularly by focusing on large deals, top accounts and our newer service lines,” Jalona said.

US visa norms

While he sees a strong deal pipeline, Jalona said headwinds related to visa restrictions in the US continues to be a cause of worry.

“Global mobility continues to be a challenge for the industry as well as for us. We have significantly reduced our dependency on onsite with the help of technologies such as video conferencing. We are also hiring locally to handle the issue,” he said.

However, according to him, the bigger challenge is training people for newer technologies that are rapidly evolving, leading to severe skills shortage.

Hiring, training

“Technologies such as automation, analytics, AI, RPA, etc require different kind of skillsets as well as working in an agile manner. Training people in good old days required training them in four broad technologies. Today, there are thousands of SKUs. Training in an organisation is a challenge as you don’t get enough trained talent, thus making the ability to address the market itself a big challenge,” Jalona said.

Yet, the company plans to continue hiring aggressively. In the reported quarter, L&T Infotech hired 1,264 employees, while it plans to recruit over 2,000 in the third quarter. “Our revenues are growing rapidly and we need to continue hiring to meet the demand,” Jalona said.

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