Mindtree Q2 Net up 15%; confident of beating Nasscom guidance

Posting 15.1 per cent rise in its net profit for the September quarter, IT firm Mindtree today said it is confident of beating Nasscom's industry growth guidance of 12-14 per cent despite a traditionally slow third quarter.
The mid-sized firm posted a net profit of Rs 158.2 crore in the July-September, 2015 quarter as compared to Rs 137.4 crore in the year-ago period.
Its revenue increased by 31.6 per cent to Rs 1,169.3 crore for the second quarter from Rs 888.6 crore in the year-ago period.
"This has been a stellar quarter on all fronts. Our recent strong deal wins and strategic acquisitions will fuel growth in the coming quarters," Mindtree CEO and Managing Director Krishnakumar Natarajan told reporters on a conference call.

He added that there is a strong momentum in deal closures, especially for digital transformation deal that are also growing in size.
Talking about the quarter ahead, Natarajan said traditionally the third quarter is weak on account of leaves and furloughs.

"Q3 is seasonally weak as there are leaves and furloughs. Also, there is a European client scaling down... There are furloughs from enterprise as well... Despite these headwinds, we expect the quarter to be better than Q3 last year. There is a healthy funnel and we will beat Nasscom's growth estimate," he said.
The third quarter is traditionally weaker for IT firms as business is impacted by low volume growth amid Christmas and New Year holidays and furloughs in the US and Europe.

The US and Europe are key markets for the over USD 140 billion Indian outsourcing sector.
Its larger rivals, Infosys and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) have already said the sequential revenue growth in the second half of the year could be impacted on account of fewer working days in the December quarter.
In dollar terms, the Bengaluru-based firm reported 6.8 per cent growth in net profit at USD 24.3 million and 22.6 per cent rise in revenue to USD 180.3 million.
Mindtree registered organic revenue (without acquisitions of last quarter) growth of 13.9 per cent year-on-year.
It had 296 active clients and 15,582 employees (addition of 1,801 employees gross during the quarter) as of September 30, 2015. The trailing 12 months attrition stood at 17.1 per cent.

Retail, CPG and Manufacturing accounted for Rs 240.8 crore, while BFSI and Technology, Media and Services contributed Rs 288.7 crore and Rs 355.8 crore to revenues during the quarter. Travel & Hospitality segment accounted for Rs 162.2 crore.
The Board of Directors has also recommended an interim dividend of Rs 4 per equity share (40 per cent) for the quarter.