I recently had the opportunity to meet with the Alorica executive team for an update on the integration of its recent acquisition, West Corporation’s Agent Services business. In March 2015, privately held Alorica acquired West’s Agent Services business for $275m in cash. In 2014, the Agent Services business generated ~$580m in revenue. Alorica anticipates $1.2bn in combined revenue [...]

CGI's Q3 FY 15 results included: Revenues of CDN$2.56bn, down 3.5% y/y in CC and flat sequentially Adjusted EBIT margin of 14.5%, up 167 bps y/y Full results are available here. The y/y CC revenue decline (the same as in Q2) is attributed to the wind down of U.S. government healthcare projects, continued delays in U.S. federal procurement, and the slowdown in U.K. government sp[...]

The recent merger of Willis Group and Towers Watson has created a global advisory and brokerage firm valued at $18bn. The deal was met with raised eyebrows by several financial analysts, who argued that Towers Watson shareholders were being short-changed in a deal with significant strategic risks, all for the benefit of revenue synergies and the tax savings that will result from moving its tax hea[...]

"We are making progress in some areas, but we know we can and should do better in other areas. Our direction is unchanged; we are making several shifts in the way that we execute against it” Ursula Burns. On Friday, Xerox announced results for Q2 2015 (for full details, see here): Xerox Services revenues were $2,569m, down 3.1% y/y (on continuing operations), up 1% in CC Segm[...]

The theme of KellyOCG’s recent analyst day was ‘Talent Supply Chain Management’, which they demonstrated using their latest online analytics portal, ‘Talent Supply Chain Analytics’ (TSC Analytics). The portal has the ability to propose the optimal number of suppliers for a job category, based on supply chain modelling that has identified correlations between the nu[...]

Infosys Q1 FY 16 results: Revenues were $2,256m, up 5.8% year-over-year (y/y) as reported, up 10.9% in constant currency and up 4.5% sequentially Operating income (EBIT) was $541m, a margin of 24.0%, a y/y decrease of 115 bps, and a sequential decrease of 173 bps. See here for the full results "I’m very pleased with our overall performance for the quarter” sai[...]

Key features of Wipro Q1 FY16 results:                                                                                                      [...]

A couple of weeks ago, Hinduja Global Services (HGS) announced that it is to acquire Mphasis' Indian domestic BPO division for Rs. 17 crore. For around $2.7m, HGS will pick up seven contact centers in Noida, Raipur, Indore, Mangalore, Pune and two buildings in Bangalore, with a total seat count of 6,400, and ~7,500 employees - and a business that was generating around $22m in annual revenue. T[...]

At Ceridian’s recent annual client conference, CEO David Ossip signaled a shift in company vision, from transforming HR (2013) to ‘making work life better’ (2015). And while transformation is still an important HR theme, Ceridian is now turning its attention to helping clients engage with their employees more effectively. Ceridian’s top three business priorities are empl[...]

KPMG recently announced its intention to acquire Towers Watson's Human Resources Service Delivery (HRSD) practice to strengthen its global HR transformation capabilities, including Workday implementations. The acquisition is expected to close by end of Q3 2015. This is a wise move, given the high growth rate of Workday. Although Workday does not break out its financial results between [...]

French CMS vendor Groupe Acticall is to acquire Sitel Worldwide, buying the 86% stake owned by Onex for ~$55m including an earn-out component. Groupe Acticall has financing for the acquisition from Société Générale and BNP Paribas It comes as no surprise that Onex is selling its stake in Sitel. What is perhaps a surprise is the size of the company making the acquisit[...]

In 2012 Genpact was starting to get behind the curve. Many of its competitors had caught up with the need for process framework methodologies and it was struggling to combine its IT assets with its business process services business. In addition, despite its focus on process excellence, Genpact sometimes lacked depth of domain expertise with the result that its execution was variable across accoun[...]

I recently attended Genpact’s industry analyst and advisor conference, at which the vendor described its approach to success in a time of rapid change for enterprise operations delivery. It believes that most enterprises are ‘cemented’ in the wrong place due to challenges with legacy processes underpinned by legacy technology, and that enterprises unable to adapt quickly will die[...]

On July 3, Infosys announced it has been awarded a multi-year application development and management (ADM) services contract by Allied Irish Banks (AIB). As a strategic partner to AIB, Infosys will: Provide application development and management, and transformation and innovation services Set up a 200-seat facility in Dublin to house staff who will be transferring from [...]

Not long ago the concept of blended learning typically meant formal instructor-led training combined with self-paced e-learning. Now it includes both formal and informal methods delivered in a variety of modes. The widespread use of mobile technologies cannot be ignored, and now the trend is for on-demand and just-in-time (JIT) learning. Microlearning is also increasing in importance: while mil[...]

HP Separation Steaming Ahead (see our initial comments on the news of the HP break up here:) At the HP Discover event in Las Vegas earlier this month, the last before the break up of goliath HP into two organizations - HP Enterprise (HPE) and HP Inc. (HPI) - CEO Meg Whitman (the future CEO of HPE) took pains to highlight the progress that has been made in preparing for and organizing the sep[...]

NelsonHall recently attended an EXL advisor and client event in London. What a difference in 18 months! Back in November 2013, EXL received a notice of termination from its largest client at the time (an event that was unfortunate, but not due to under-performance). The impact of this on 2014 results was significant: a $38m reduction in revenues from this client[...]

Summary: While 2014 was a “transformational year” for Atos MS and Worldline businesses, Atos’ C&SI business has also been reinventing itself. 2014 saw good progress against nearly all of the unit’s three year financial targets Atos C&SI has been making substantial investments to strengthen its capabilities to support clients in their digital transformation a[...]

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[...]

In early May, IBM and SAP announced a partnership to provide enhanced HR software and services to each other’s clients.  On June 5, IBM Kenexa and SAP SuccessFactors execs held a call to further explain the rationale for the partnership and its expected benefits. This includes integration and access to each other’s HCM software, allowing clients to select the offering that best me[...]