India’s second largest IT service exporter company, Infosys is planning to acquire startups in high-value technology areas such as artificial intelligence, big data and analytics betting on these trends to generate future revenues. The first non-founder CEO Vishal Sikka, is keenly looking for such firms globally.
Sikka’s interest in smaller tech firms is also linked to his background and profile. His long league with SAP and the strong connection with the Silicon Valley in the US will accelerate this drive.
“We have been aggressive unlike in the past when we were more conservative. We are looking at these technology areas much more closely”, said the Chief operating Officer,UB Pravin Rao.
Adding to his statement, Rao said, Infosys would also be looking at acquisitions which are complementary to its array of IT services and could bring in additional value.
In comparison with Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) and Wipro, Infosys has been always legal in terms of acquisition and its last acquisition was of Switzerland-headquartered technology consultancy firm, Lodestone in September, 2012 for around $350 million.
Recently the company increased its funds fivefold from $100 Mn to focus on new ideas and products and expanded its global innovation fund to $500 Mn in startups. The COO of Infosys said, “We could look at bundling these solutions with our banking product Finacle.”
Related: Infosys Bets Big On Tech Startups
Last year, Infosys backed a few startups and seed funded companies like OnMobile and expressed its interest in working with two US-based tech firms. One in video technology and analytics company, Ooyala and and other an enterprise communications technology platform, Clique Intelligence, to use their new generation technologies which will allow the IT services firm to transform enterprises.
