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Wipro sets up European Development Centre in UK

Wipro Technologies, the flagship company of the Bangalore-based Wipro Corporation on Thursday opened its first European Development Centre at Reading in the United Kingdom.

UK minister for eBusiness Patricia Hewitt inaugurated the facility, which marks the first phase of the Rs 24-billion Wipro’s plans for investment in expanding its UK infrastructure.

The centre will commence operations by providing application development, support and maintenance of IS applications to Wipro’s UK-based customers such as Thames Water and NTL.

Lauding Wipro for choosing her country for locating the EDC, Ms Hewitt, who is also an MP for Leicester West, said besides pushing the bi-lateral trade and investment between India and the UK, the centre would provide jobs locally.

Wipro Corporation chairman and India’s richest billionaire Azim Premji said on the occasion that the Reading Development Centre was a testimony to the commitment made by the company to be a long-term player in the European market.

"It also reflects our philosophy of being a global company with a local face. We are convinced that we have a powerful value proposition, which can offer immense benefits to European corporations grappling with the challenges of transforming to the New Economy. This centre will be the springboard for delivering quality services to our European business partners," Premji asserted.

According to Wipro Technologies’ vice-president for European operations Sudip Nandy, the European market for IT services is growing rapidly due to rising e-business initiatives, time-to-market pressures, and shortage of IT skills in European corporations.

"We are observing a rising trend among companies of all sizes to outsource the whole or part of their information systems to remain competitive. This centre will enable us to respond quicker and provide faster delivery of solutions to our key customers in the UK and rest of Europe," Nandy affirmed.

Initially, the centre will have a 50-strong application specialists and programmers. Wipro also plans to hire local talent to meet the demands of the centre. It will provide localised consulting and implementation services, besides undertaking complete ownership of specific ARE applications, supported through its other global distributed development centres.

Wipro has been operating in the European market over the last 6 years. It has a strong presence in the UK where it works with leading companies like Transco, Thomas Cook, NTL, Thames Water, and Nortel. It also has a strong presence in Scandinavia where it works with some of the leading telecom companies.

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