Wipro planning European acquisitions

Wipro is planning to make some European acquisitions soon, chairman Azim Premji said in an interview published in The Guardian yesterday.

"We cannot afford to be out of UK, Germany or France - all of which have markets of the same size. Hopefully, we will be making some European acquisitions soon," Premji said in the interview.

With a customer list that includes Sony, Microsoft, Nokia and Dell, Wipro has seen profits triple to $230 million (115 million pounds) and sales double to more than $1.2 billion during the last four years.

Answering a question on why business comes to Wipro, Premji pointed to the large pool of English-speaking, technically trained graduates whose pay packets are considerably slimmer than their contemporaries abroad.

"Wipro can choose from 2,80,000 engineering graduates every year with another 2,00,000 diploma holders who are easily trainable. In the United States, there are just 50,000 engineering graduates annually. In fact, colleges there produce more sports therapists than engineers," Premji said.