Wipro Infotech bags Aircel outsourcing order

In one of the largest IT outsourcing deals in the area of telecom, Wipro Infotech - the domestic, Middle East and Asia Pacific IT services business of Wipro Technologies - has bagged a multi-year outsourcing contract from telecom services provider Aircel, a Maxis group company. The contract will be executed over a period of nine years, sources in Aircel said.

As per the contract, Wipro will be responsible for delivering the next generation business transformation to Aircel through business-IT alignment, implementation of future-ready IT architecture and deployment of tools to sustain comprehensive IT operations over the life of the contract.

"We found a great partner in Wipro. Although we had been working with them earlier, it was in a much smaller scale. We are now taking this into a much intense partnership, where they will be our partner in long-term business transformation as we are set to expand our pan-India presence. The partnership will also provide us the scalability in our IT operation," Rohit Chandra, executive director, Aircel, told Business Standard.

Aircel, which started its operations in Tamil Nadu, today boasts of 9.5 million subscribers with presence in 10 circle across the country including Assam, Bihar, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Orissa and West Bengal. The company has also applied to launch its services in the remaining 13 circles, which will be executed once the spectrum is available.

Chandra said the company was handling its IT infrastructure internally, but as it was growing up in size and scale, and ready to launch some next generation of services such as MobileTV, WiMax and 3G, Wipro would be playing a major role in providing these services.

During the last two years, Wipro Infotech has won 10 total outsourcing deals including the Dena Bank and HDFC Bank deals. However this would be the company's first total outsourcing deal in the area of telecom, said Anil Jain, VP (corporate business unit), Wipro Infotech.