India's Infosys FY99 Profit May Have Doubled to 1.36 Bln Rupees
Bangalore, April 9 (Bloomberg) -- Infosys Technologies Ltd.,India's best known software
developer, may have doubled its profit in fiscal 1999, as it won increasingly complex software
contracts abroad for which it charged higher rates.
Bangalore-based Infosys, which became the first Indian company to trade in the U.S. after it
sold American Depositary Receipts last month, will report earnings for the quarter and fiscal
year ended March 31 by 10 a.m. local time. The announcement flags off India's quarterly
earnings season which, analysts say, will reassure investors that software companies remain
their best bets as the rest of the economy slumped for the third year.
Infosys may unveil profit of 1.36 billion rupees ($32 million) for the twelve months ended last
month, compared with 603.7 million rupees for the same period a year ago, according to a
Bloomberg survey of three analysts. Profit for the fourth-quarter may have risen to 435
million rupees, from 191 million rupees for the same quarter last year, they said.
''They moved up the value chain (fetching higher profit margins), increased productivity and
won a lot of reengineering contracts,'' said Jignesh Bhate, an analyst at Indosuez W.I. Carr
Securities India Pvt.
Higher profits from developing software which help companies such as Reebok International
Ltd. distribute its shoes worldwide and Nordstrom Inc. manage its inventory in its department
stores,helped Infosys accelerate its profit in fiscal 1999, from a 62 percent expansion in the
previous year.
Infosys, along with other hot Indian software companies have climbed more than 150 percent,
making them among Asia's best-performing stocks even as the region was hit by an economic
meltdown. |
