Kerala IT companies get calls from Satyam’s clients, employees

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM - It is advantage time for IT companies in Kerala. With Satyam under a cloud, the software companies in the state are busy trying to win over clients of the tainted IT bellwether even as they are flooded with job applications from Satyam employees.

A few large IT companies in the state either work with Satyam or are competitors.

The head of a leading IT company told IANS on the condition of anonymity, that across the IT industry efforts to take over Satyam’s clients in India or abroad has begun and they were also at it.

‘We are working aggressively in India and abroad for this,’ the IT firm chief said.

Meanwhile, efforts to reassure nervous clients have also begun.

V.K. Mathews, chief of IBS Software Services - one of the biggest IT companies in the state - told IANS they have started reaching out to clients to explain their position as part of confidence building measures in the wake of what happened at Satyam.

‘One should not generalize with what happened to Satyam. The need of the hour is for regulating agencies like Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), Registrar of Companies, and the Company Law Board to step in and see that such things do not happen again,’ he added.

Kerala is home to around 200 IT companies of varying size that employ close to 25,000 people and have clients across the globe.

Last year, software exports from the state crossed Rs.1,000 crore (Rs.10 billion).

Founder president of Group of Technopark companies (GTECH), Sunil Gupta said that since Thursday, the day after the Satyam chief admitted to a Rs.70 billion fraud, he has been getting frantic calls from clients.

‘We work with Satyam for five companies in the country and we are their competitors in the US. The biggest fallout of this would be that clients will now insist on very strict insurance clauses, thereby leading to increased insurance premiums which will be borne by companies like us,’ said Gupta, CEO of the Kerala operations of the New Jersey-headquartered Collabera IT company.

Both Mathews and Gupta said since the Satyam bubble burst, they have been flooded with resumes of Satyam employees.

‘Satyam employees are of high quality and certainly we will be hiring those who are suitable depending on our requirements,’ Mathews said.