on Saturday said the company's board has no differences with the promoters and the so-called problems were media creation. The company held its 36th annual general meeting in Bangalore on Saturday.
Here are the key takeways:
Compensation to key personnel: In its AGM, a company spokesperson said that the IT major was aware of the fact that the compensation gap between the top management and employees has widened. The spokesperson .. said that the IT major was aware of the fact that the compensation gap between the top management and employees has widened. The spokesperson recognized that the company's communication on compensation could have been better. To address that, it has restructured compensation to stock-based rewards, it said. Here's a look a remuneration of key personnals at Infosys:
Rising protectionism: In a letter to shareholders, CEO Vishal Sikka said that FY17 brought with it environmental challenges such as rising protectionism, accelerating commoditization, elevated client expectations and new competition.
"Internally, we had challenges to bring stability to our consulting business and growth to our Finacle and BPO businesses. But amidst all of this, it behoves us to stay focused on our longer-term mission to drive rapid growth in software-led offerings, to capture demand in newer service lines and to renew our core services — a mission to deliver consistent, profitable growth for the benefit of all our stakeholders," Sikka said.
"Internally, we had challenges to bring stability to our consulting business and growth to our Finacle and BPO businesses. But amidst all of this, it behoves us to stay focused on our longer-term mission to drive rapid growth in software-led offerings, to capture demand in newer service lines and to renew our core services — a mission to deliver consistent, profitable growth for the benefit of all our stakeholders," Sikka said.
Infosys eyeing to return RS 13,000 crore to Shareholders Infosys chairman R. Seshasayee says the firm is in the process of finalising a suitable ‘distribution mechanism’ for its Rs13,000-crore capital allocation plan to shareholders.
Bengaluru: India’s second largest IT company Infosys Ltd on Saturday said it is in the process of finalising a suitable “distribution mechanism” for its Rs13,000-crore capital allocation plan to shareholders for this fiscal.
Speaking at the 36th annual general meeting (AGM) of the company, chairman R. Seshasayee said Infosys is committed to execute the capital allocation policy announced on 13 April “in a timely manner”. “As the company has a large shareholder base and is listed in multiple countries, the manner of distribution to shareholders requires compliance under laws of several jurisdictions,” he said.
Infosys, he added, is in the process of finalising a “distribution mechanism” that complies with the applicable regulatory requirements in the “best interest” of all shareholders. Over the past few months, the Bengaluru-based tech giant has received criticism from various quarters over issues like alleged governance lapses and high compensation doled out to top executives. It was also under pressure to return surplus cash to shareholders through buyback or liberal dividends.
In a bid to bring about “further transparency”, Infosys has now put up a document on its website detailing out the policy on executive compensation, the key performance indicators for variable pay and other related matters, Seshasayee said.
The founders, including N.R. Narayana Murthy, have been vocal about the high compensation paid to chief executive officer (CEO) Vishal Sikka and chief operating officer (COO) U.B. Pravin Rao and have also questioned the severance package paid to former chief financial officer (CFO) Rajiv Bansal and general counsel David Kennedy. Founders seemed to have given the company’s AGM a miss.
Seshasayee further said the board believes it is their duty to “listen” every shareholder and introspect further to improve performance or take corrective actions. “When comments are made by founders, we consider them even more seriously and respectfully, as we all recognise that we are but trustees of an extraordinary institution that has been the result of labour, foresight and genius of an extraordinary group of founders,” he said. Seshasayee, who retires next year, admitted that the company’s communication related to leadership compensation “could have been better”.
“In the aftermath of criticism, the board introspected and recognised that our communication in this matter could have been better,” he said. He blamed the media for misinterpreting the management’s relationship with the founders. “I should note that the board’s relationship with the founders is often the subject of certain inaccurate media reports,” he said
The recent reports suggested that the board had added a risk factor in its recent SEC filing just to send a veiled message to the founders. “This is not true as this risk factor was inserted as per applicable law,” he clarified. He also highlighted the transformation that Infosys was undergoing especially amid an uncertain external environment. These included transformation into a software-plus company, one pertaining to global leadership talent, and the “rather abrupt transition” from being a promoter-led board and management to an independent and professionally managed company.
“None of this is easy,” he said. Seshasayee said rapidly spreading protectionism and escalating demand from clients for more value for their technology investment together had made the business environment “extremely challenging”. “We have instituted a committee of directors to closely monitor execution and enhance alignment between the board and the management in strategic responses to changing market situations,” he said.
Driverless golf cart by Infosys
infosys is testing a driverless golf cart built jointly with the indian institute of technology -Delhiusing open source technologies, to demonstrate its capability and to tap growing global opportunities for autonomous and connected vehicles.
Vishal Sikka, chief executive of infosys spoke about the “How, What and Why” of adopting greater automation and AI at the 36th annual general meeting and disclosed the company's attempt to create a pool of thousands of engineers with capability to work on projects in artificial intiligence and tap business opportunities.
Vishal Sikka, chief executive of infosys spoke about the “How, What and Why” of adopting greater automation and AI at the 36th annual general meeting and disclosed the company's attempt to create a pool of thousands of engineers with capability to work on projects in artificial intiligence and tap business opportunities.
“Autonomous driving is something every automobile company will get into, and we are trying to build talent around this,” Sikka said, highlighting the infosys self driving golf cart at its Mysuru campus was built using open source technologies. “Advances in AI are automating more and more cognitive work that people perform.”
He added that infosys is part of Toyota Motors’ connected cars project, and would look to skill more of its people in emerging areas, such as drones, robots and clouds
Sikka, who completes three years as the first non-founder CEO of Infosys, says the company has been able to slowly make the shift towards building software led services model that generates high growth and high margin business in areas such as mainframe modernisation and API Economy.
He said that the company's software offerings such as NIA, Panaya, Skava and Edgeverve grew 42 per cent in the last fiscal, with NIA, the artificial intilegence.
He added that infosys is part of Toyota Motors’ connected cars project, and would look to skill more of its people in emerging areas, such as drones, robots and clouds
Sikka, who completes three years as the first non-founder CEO of Infosys, says the company has been able to slowly make the shift towards building software led services model that generates high growth and high margin business in areas such as mainframe modernisation and API Economy.
He said that the company's software offerings such as NIA, Panaya, Skava and Edgeverve grew 42 per cent in the last fiscal, with NIA, the artificial intilegence.
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