Wipro sees growth to pick up in Q1

By S. John Tilak and Ratul Ray Chaudhuri

BANGALORE (Reuters) - Wipro Ltd WIPR WIT expects to see a pickup in growth in the first quarter as companies firm up their outsourcing plans, a top executive said.

Chief Financial Officer Suresh Senapaty told the Reuters India Investment Summit on Tuesday that he expects decision making by clients to accelerate in the latter part of the fourth quarter, leading to "decent growth" from first quarter onwards.

Senapaty, however, was cautious about the next quarter. "Don't expect something great to happen in the fourth quarter."

India's No. 3 software services exporter has forecast 0.9 percent sequential growth for the third quarter from IT services, its biggest segment.

"In this quarter and, perhaps, part of the next quarter you will see an environment of uncertainty. Therefore, decision making is slowing down," he said.

Senapaty expects the technology budgets of Wipro's customers to fall in 2009 as they delay decision making and tighten costs.

In such an environment, which he compared to the Depression of the 1930s, information technology was not getting "the right kind of priority" from the top management of companies, he said. The crisis has also resulted in delays and some cancellations of projects for the company.