Wipro succeeds in convincing Origin Energy to stay put

Wipro, the Bangalore-based business conglomerate with interests in IT and FMCG, has succeeded in convincing one of its recently-won clients about the circumstances under which the World Bank had imposed a ban on the company.

The company had bagged a multi-million dollar 10-year business transformation contract from Origin Energy after a successful bidding which saw participation from Indian and global IT service providers. However, Wipro’s continuation with Origin Energy has hung in the balance after the World Bank slapped a four-year ban on Wipro for ‘providing improper benefits to bank staff’. After this, Origin, a major player in the energy and utility space in Australia , had sought clarification from Wipro.

“We provided all details to the client regarding the situation that led to the World Bank incident and they are convinced,” a spokesperson of the company told Business Standard.

The company’s joint CEO Suresh Vaswani had signed the contract with Origin Energy in Sydney in October last year. As per the mandate of the contract, Wipro was committed to provide an integrated billing system as well as IT and back-office support for Origin’s retail business. The transition of the programme was supposed to happen towards the middle of 2009, and expected to be completed in the next two years.

Wipro is a major player in the energy and utility space, and derives over 8 per cent of its revenue from this sector. Other than Origin Energy, Wipro’s other clients in Australia include ANZ Bank, Telstra, Axa, Cadbury’s and Hutchison. Wipro has said that other than Origin Energy, no other client had sought a clarification from the company on the World Bank ban.