This is the second of three articles examining M&A activity in IT services during 2015. Last time we looked at how M&A activity was being driven by $10bn to $15bn vendors. This time we take a look at M&A around newer service offerings and digital transformation. The firms that are acquiring capabilities in digital services are vendors in good financial health that have mostly alre[...]

It is three years since Tech Mahindra finalized its merger with Satyam, a challenging journey of 18 months, to diversify its client base from BT (29% of revenues in Q3 FY 2013), the telecom services overall and from Europe (its then largest vertical by far, representing 46% of revenues). At the Tech Mahindra indicated several ambitious targets for CY 2015: Reaching $5bn in annual revenues by[...]

Reflecting slightly improved macro-economic conditions, 2015 was an active year for M&A activity in the IT services industry. The largest acquisition - for some years - was that of IGATE by Capgemini. And there was a large number of small to mid-sized transactions. When analyzing this active M&A activity, several findings are striking: In spite of all the intensive discu[...]

CSC has just laid out the financial targets of the standalone business which will retain the CSC moniker when the U.S federal company, CRSA, breaks off.  As well as CSC’s global commercial business, it includes non-U.S. public sector businesses (~$700m revenues in FY15). In its FY15 (ending March 31, 2015) this part of CSC achieved revenues of $8.1bn, and an adjusted operating margin[...]

Capgemini Group recently briefed on its R&D services/product engineering testing capabilities in its Sogeti High Tech subsidiary. Background Sogeti High Tech (SHT) is a subsidiary of Sogeti (itself a subsidiary of Capgemini). It provides product engineering services (PES)/R&D services. The company has a background in servicing key aeronautic sector clients. The company has expanded i[...]

On October 6th, NelsonHall held its quarterly IT outsourcing (ITO) Index webcast, presented by Dominique Raviart, Research Director for IT Services research. In Q3 2015, ITO bookings were down 30% year-on-year overall. In North America, bookings declined by 60% y/y, while Europe was up 60% y/y. Over the Q1-Q3 2015 period, ITO bookings were down 30% y/y overall. North America was down [...]

Three questions are commonly being aired these days about the delivery of IT services in support of digital transformation initiatives. Having heard each of these being raised several times, we thought it is a good time to put them through a bit of a reality check. First up for examination... Is “Fail Fast, Move On” the Right Approach to Digital Transformation Projects? The [...]

Virtusa recently briefed NelsonHall on its Pegasystems application testing IP and service offering, and specifically the newly launched ADOPT testing framework, which illustrates the growing maturity of testing services offerings. Virtusa was founded in 1996 and is headquartered in Westborough (Massachusetts) with large delivery facilities in India and Sri-Lanka. The company largely provides ap[...]

Tech Mahindra Testing Services recently briefed NelsonHall on several of its IP investments, specifically around DevOps, its Integrated Automation Framework (iAF), and its connectors for scriptless automation software products. Software testing remains a labor-intensive activity, and the main testing automation software products continue to be mostly used in test execution. IT services vendor I[...]

NIIT Technologies recently shared insights regarding its push into digital services. This digital push adds to existing priorities, which include growth intentions in North America and Europe and a strong focus on its IT infrastructure services. Meanwhile, the company is maintaining its established focus on clients in three core verticals: transportation, insurance and BFS (which combined acc[...]

NelsonHall recently caught up with the management of SQS to discuss its recent acquisitions and its plans in North America. SQS has this month completed the acquisition of Trissential, a U.S.-based firm operating in the Mid-West, with headquarters in Chicago. The company had 2014 revenues of $32.3m, a PBT of $1.6m, and headcount of 130. Why Trissential? Unlike its two previous acquisitions&n[...]

CSC has announced a planned break up by October 25 2015 into two firms: CSC U.S. Public Sector (FY 15 revenues: $4.1bn) and CSC Global Commercial ($8.1bn, also includes non-U.S. public sector). See here for details: The announcement ends a long period of speculation over the posssible sale of CSC's North American Public Sector unit[...]

Capgemini recently briefed NelsonHall on changes in its analytics and big data practice. The company has recently rebranded its business information management (BIM) global service line (GSL) as Insights & Data (I&D) and announced the availability in H2 2015 of its analytics platform, ‘Insights-as-a-Service’. Background In 2010 Capgemini created BIM as a GSL which, in Cap[...]

NelsonHall recently spent two weeks in India, focusing on latest developments in software testing and digital transformation services. We met with Capgemini Group’s Testing Global Service Line (TGSL), the group’s software testing practice (across Capgemini and Sogeti) and discussed key topics including its push towards cross-client shared service centers, and IP development (with the r[...]

NelsonHall recently met with the management of Atos to discuss the acquisitions of Bull and Xerox ITO and the progress being made by Atos in adopting Indian offshoring. Note that this meeting took place before Atos' Consulting & Systems Integration analyst day. Bull: Is An Expanded Portfolio Relevant? With its acquisition of Bull, Atos has acquired an IT firm with a significant level[...]

This week NelsonHall held its quarterly IT Outsourcing (ITO) Index webcast to report on the latest developments in ITO contract activity and present an analysis of spending activity for IT services, professional services (i.e. consulting and systems integration) and ITO. Background ITO Index data shows a steady (but non-linear) decline in Total Contract Value (TCV) from 2002 onwards. The lev[...]

Sopra Steria has announced its financial results for 2014, focusing on its profitability performance (revenues were previously published in February). Our key takeaways from the announcement are discussed here. U.K. Will Continue to Outperform Other Sopra Steria Geographies in 2015 Sopra Steria U.K. had phenomenal growth in 2014 (+18.2% organically) to ~€859m. Profitability was high (ad[...]

NelsonHall has recently completed a series of visits in India, addressing a number of topics including software testing, application management and digital transformation services. NelsonHall met with software testing pure-play, Cigniti Technologies, now the largest of all India-based testing pure plays. The company has a headcount of 1,600, ahead of Maveric Systems (~1,200) and QA Infotech (~8[...]

At Cognizant’s European analyst event in Berlin, the topic of digital transformation and in particular its Horizon 3 services dominated discussions. Horizon 3 services now represent a NelsonHall estimated 10% of revenues (~$1.0bn in 2014). Horizon 3 includes new services such as digital services as well as new business models and new sectors/new geographies. Digital Transformation Cogn[...]

TCS has briefed NelsonHall on the recent launch of its DevOps related IP, Non-Production Environment Tracking and Release Automation (NETRA). With NETRA, TCS Assurance Services Unit (ASU), the main testing unit of TCS, is pursuing its strategy originated with Intelligent Testing Systems (ITS) to develop broad-reaching IPs, encompassing open source software, COTS, and TCS-developed accelerators.[...]