RIYADH: India’s IT czar Azim Hashim Premji, who has given away almost half of his stake holding in Wipro, India’s third largest exporter of software services, to philanthropy; has been at the helm of Wipro since the late 1960s.
He is credited with turning what was then a tiny hydrogenated cooking fat company into a multi-billion dollar Revenue IT, BPO and R&D Services organization with presence in more than 58 countries.
Premji has been inspired by only one idea, and that is to build a business entity deeply committed to values, with the firm belief that success in business eventually but inevitably follows.
The billionaire business tycoon strongly believes that ordinary people are capable of extraordinary things when properly organized with dedication, sincerity and hard work.
In fact, Premji has tapped India’s abundant engineering talent to serve India and a large number of countries across the globe including Saudi Arabia.
Such success, Premji says in an interview with Arab News, shows that hard ways pays.
Defying all speculation of recession, he said that he would ‘continue to invest in Saudi Arabia’ and elsewhere in the region.
An ardent admirer of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman, he speaks highly about the Kingdom, its new generation of leadership and the new Saudi Vision 2030.
In India and abroad, Premji’s rise has been a source of inspiration for young entrepreneurs.
In his interview, he touched on several issues including Wipro Arabia’s growth in the Kingdom, new Women Business Park project, and his own CSR initiative called Azim Premji Foundation.
The foundation is a not-for profit organization that has been working toward making deep, large scale and institutionalized impact on the quality and equity of education in India, along with related development areas.
The Foundation today works in more than eight states of India, which together have more than 3,50,000 schools.
Here are the excerpts of the interview:
Q. Wipro is in the process of establishing an all-women business park, which will be the first such facility in the Kingdom. Please provide some relevant information about this project, its cost component, clients and technology?
A. The Women’s Business Park will be established through a joint venture between Wipro Arabia Limited and Princess Nora bint Abdulrahman University (PNU), the largest women university in the world. Saudi Aramco is the strategic adviser to this initiative.
The joint venture will leverage Wipro’s expertise in managing talent and providing IT services to a multi-industry customer base.
Wipro will be responsible for developing the park’s facilities and infrastructure as well as training and employing Saudi women.
The park will provide Engineering Drafting Services, as well as Business Process and Information Technology services to customers from multiple industries such as oil and gas, manufacturing, government, medical, telecom and construction.
Q. The Women’s Business Park will go a long way in contributing to the economic growth of the Kingdom through the participation of women in the Saudi economy? Please spell out the benefits in terms of training, services and education, which this park will offer.
A. The Women’s Business Park will play a significant role in developing talent and a female workforce with advanced industry knowledge. This workforce will be equipped to deliver values-based services to clients across a wide range of industry sectors.
This initiative would also help the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia diversify into knowledge-based services economy.
It also enables women to play a critical role in the economy and contribute to the growth of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Q. How is Wipro Arabia Ltd. doing in terms of business? What about your presence in this region including the Kingdom?
A. Wipro is one of the fastest growing companies regionally and globally, and I am personally very excited with our journey in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
We are present in the Kingdom for 15 plus years and have made strong investments locally to align with priorities of the region and our client expectations.
We are partners to leading organizations across industries and have delivered marquee and transformational programs.
We are proud to have been recognized as a leader in the IT Services space in the Kingdom.
Today, Wipro is among the top two IT Services organization in the Kingdom and is engaged with customers across various industries like oil and gas, utilities, EPC, telecom, BFSI, government, transport and health care.
Q In a competitive market like Saudi Arabia, how do you differentiate Wipro from its competitors and define what makes the brand unique? Is Saudi Arabia the fastest growing market for Wipro in the Middle East and Africa region in terms of revenue and customers?
A. Wipro Arabia is a joint venture company, with Dar Al Riyadh, a well-diversified group in Saudi Arabia.
Over the years, Wipro Arabia has emerged as a strategic IT partner to some of the biggest names in the Kingdom.
Saudi Arabia has proved to be the growth engine for Wipro.
We continue to be positive about the growth potential of this region and will continue to invest in the country.
We have proven our value in executing large complex programs, leveraging our comprehensive portfolio of applications, infrastructure services, analytics, digital services etc. That has enabled us to differentiate through delivering large turnkey programs.
Our comprehensive portfolio coupled with domain capabilities along with our proven capability in executing large transformational projects gives us the unique positioning in the Kingdom.
Q. What is the total number of employees Wipro has in Saudi Arabia? How many of them are Saudis? Is there any plan to further Saudize your workforce? How many Saudis will be employed by the company, say like, within next five years? (Even a conservative estimate will do).
A. Wipro has a committed localization policy with almost 34 percent of employees being Saudi nationals currently on our payroll.
Through the Women Business Park, we are looking to increase employment opportunities for women in the region by building competency in managerial and technical positions across business lines.
Recruitment, training and development of local talent is a continuous process and we remain committed to Saudization and fostering gender diversity, that will eventually contribute to sustained growth and development of the kingdom and the region as a whole.
Q. What are your key priorities for Wipro for the coming year (2016 and 2017) in order to retain your leadership position in the Saudi market and the Middle East market as a whole?
A. We will continue to focus on our customers, delivering the right solutions for them, regardless of industry sector. To do that, we intend to bring in further domain competence for a number of identified industries, continue our work in localization and to make strategic investments in the new technologies that our customers will use to differentiate themselves.
Q. How has Wipro used IT to build a strong foundation as you pursue excellence? Give a brief answer.
A. IT has become an integral part of every business.
We not only have technical competence but also focus on domain understanding to bring value to our customer.
Technology is the foundation of our business. Keeping this in mind, Wipro Arabia has created industry-wise structure, which allows us to focus on deep domain challenges of customers and provide solutions to overcome those.
We also continue to invest in various new technologies and trends which are relevant in today’s and future context of business.
Q. What is your advice to young entrepreneurs and start-ups in India and GCC, who aspire to become a highly successful IT or business tycoon like you?
A. My advice is to learn from every conversation, every meeting and every day.
To be successful, you need to be willing to work hard both on your business and yourself. And we should always remember that there is nothing more important than integrity.
Q. The Azim Premji Foundation has done significant work in the field of education and has collaborated with the government in different states of India for welfare projects. Which are the major projects and initiatives launched by the foundation so far?
A. We have worked on many dimensions of education in the past 15 years. All our work has been focused on helping improve the quality and equity of education of the public schooling system. Today, we work in six states, which have over 350,000 schools.
In 47 of the most disadvantaged districts we have (or are setting up) institutions which work on capacity development of teachers, head-teachers and other functionaries.
We also work on matters of curriculum, on assessment, and on policy.
We have established a not-for-profit university focused on education and related areas of human development.
The university is like a national level resource institution.
We are continuing to expand and deepen our work further in impoverished and needy segments of society in India.
He is credited with turning what was then a tiny hydrogenated cooking fat company into a multi-billion dollar Revenue IT, BPO and R&D Services organization with presence in more than 58 countries.
Premji has been inspired by only one idea, and that is to build a business entity deeply committed to values, with the firm belief that success in business eventually but inevitably follows.
The billionaire business tycoon strongly believes that ordinary people are capable of extraordinary things when properly organized with dedication, sincerity and hard work.
In fact, Premji has tapped India’s abundant engineering talent to serve India and a large number of countries across the globe including Saudi Arabia.
Such success, Premji says in an interview with Arab News, shows that hard ways pays.
Defying all speculation of recession, he said that he would ‘continue to invest in Saudi Arabia’ and elsewhere in the region.
An ardent admirer of Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Salman, he speaks highly about the Kingdom, its new generation of leadership and the new Saudi Vision 2030.
In India and abroad, Premji’s rise has been a source of inspiration for young entrepreneurs.
In his interview, he touched on several issues including Wipro Arabia’s growth in the Kingdom, new Women Business Park project, and his own CSR initiative called Azim Premji Foundation.
The foundation is a not-for profit organization that has been working toward making deep, large scale and institutionalized impact on the quality and equity of education in India, along with related development areas.
The Foundation today works in more than eight states of India, which together have more than 3,50,000 schools.
Here are the excerpts of the interview:
Q. Wipro is in the process of establishing an all-women business park, which will be the first such facility in the Kingdom. Please provide some relevant information about this project, its cost component, clients and technology?
A. The Women’s Business Park will be established through a joint venture between Wipro Arabia Limited and Princess Nora bint Abdulrahman University (PNU), the largest women university in the world. Saudi Aramco is the strategic adviser to this initiative.
The joint venture will leverage Wipro’s expertise in managing talent and providing IT services to a multi-industry customer base.
Wipro will be responsible for developing the park’s facilities and infrastructure as well as training and employing Saudi women.
The park will provide Engineering Drafting Services, as well as Business Process and Information Technology services to customers from multiple industries such as oil and gas, manufacturing, government, medical, telecom and construction.
Q. The Women’s Business Park will go a long way in contributing to the economic growth of the Kingdom through the participation of women in the Saudi economy? Please spell out the benefits in terms of training, services and education, which this park will offer.
A. The Women’s Business Park will play a significant role in developing talent and a female workforce with advanced industry knowledge. This workforce will be equipped to deliver values-based services to clients across a wide range of industry sectors.
This initiative would also help the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia diversify into knowledge-based services economy.
It also enables women to play a critical role in the economy and contribute to the growth of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
Q. How is Wipro Arabia Ltd. doing in terms of business? What about your presence in this region including the Kingdom?
A. Wipro is one of the fastest growing companies regionally and globally, and I am personally very excited with our journey in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
We are present in the Kingdom for 15 plus years and have made strong investments locally to align with priorities of the region and our client expectations.
We are partners to leading organizations across industries and have delivered marquee and transformational programs.
We are proud to have been recognized as a leader in the IT Services space in the Kingdom.
Today, Wipro is among the top two IT Services organization in the Kingdom and is engaged with customers across various industries like oil and gas, utilities, EPC, telecom, BFSI, government, transport and health care.
Q In a competitive market like Saudi Arabia, how do you differentiate Wipro from its competitors and define what makes the brand unique? Is Saudi Arabia the fastest growing market for Wipro in the Middle East and Africa region in terms of revenue and customers?
A. Wipro Arabia is a joint venture company, with Dar Al Riyadh, a well-diversified group in Saudi Arabia.
Over the years, Wipro Arabia has emerged as a strategic IT partner to some of the biggest names in the Kingdom.
Saudi Arabia has proved to be the growth engine for Wipro.
We continue to be positive about the growth potential of this region and will continue to invest in the country.
We have proven our value in executing large complex programs, leveraging our comprehensive portfolio of applications, infrastructure services, analytics, digital services etc. That has enabled us to differentiate through delivering large turnkey programs.
Our comprehensive portfolio coupled with domain capabilities along with our proven capability in executing large transformational projects gives us the unique positioning in the Kingdom.
Q. What is the total number of employees Wipro has in Saudi Arabia? How many of them are Saudis? Is there any plan to further Saudize your workforce? How many Saudis will be employed by the company, say like, within next five years? (Even a conservative estimate will do).
A. Wipro has a committed localization policy with almost 34 percent of employees being Saudi nationals currently on our payroll.
Through the Women Business Park, we are looking to increase employment opportunities for women in the region by building competency in managerial and technical positions across business lines.
Recruitment, training and development of local talent is a continuous process and we remain committed to Saudization and fostering gender diversity, that will eventually contribute to sustained growth and development of the kingdom and the region as a whole.
Q. What are your key priorities for Wipro for the coming year (2016 and 2017) in order to retain your leadership position in the Saudi market and the Middle East market as a whole?
A. We will continue to focus on our customers, delivering the right solutions for them, regardless of industry sector. To do that, we intend to bring in further domain competence for a number of identified industries, continue our work in localization and to make strategic investments in the new technologies that our customers will use to differentiate themselves.
Q. How has Wipro used IT to build a strong foundation as you pursue excellence? Give a brief answer.
A. IT has become an integral part of every business.
We not only have technical competence but also focus on domain understanding to bring value to our customer.
Technology is the foundation of our business. Keeping this in mind, Wipro Arabia has created industry-wise structure, which allows us to focus on deep domain challenges of customers and provide solutions to overcome those.
We also continue to invest in various new technologies and trends which are relevant in today’s and future context of business.
Q. What is your advice to young entrepreneurs and start-ups in India and GCC, who aspire to become a highly successful IT or business tycoon like you?
A. My advice is to learn from every conversation, every meeting and every day.
To be successful, you need to be willing to work hard both on your business and yourself. And we should always remember that there is nothing more important than integrity.
Q. The Azim Premji Foundation has done significant work in the field of education and has collaborated with the government in different states of India for welfare projects. Which are the major projects and initiatives launched by the foundation so far?
A. We have worked on many dimensions of education in the past 15 years. All our work has been focused on helping improve the quality and equity of education of the public schooling system. Today, we work in six states, which have over 350,000 schools.
In 47 of the most disadvantaged districts we have (or are setting up) institutions which work on capacity development of teachers, head-teachers and other functionaries.
We also work on matters of curriculum, on assessment, and on policy.
We have established a not-for-profit university focused on education and related areas of human development.
The university is like a national level resource institution.
We are continuing to expand and deepen our work further in impoverished and needy segments of society in India.
