Genpact is the country?s largest BPO, and it realises that. So, at a time when most other companies in this vertical would like to have both IT and BPO arms, Genpact is back to building on its core area, Business Processes Management (BPM), and letting its IT arm grow at its own pace.

No one can fault CEO and president Pramod Bhasin?s logic when he says, ?We do not want to be a very big IT company. We want to be a very focused IT services business, concentrating on niche areas, particularly those that compliment what we do on the BPM front.? The IT arm of Genpact currently includes ERP implementation/support and IT infrastructure services. Bhasin met FE in early December 2010.

Perhaps the declining contribution of IT services to Genpact?s revenues (13.7% now as compared to 25% in 2007) drives this logic. Then again, while BPM got a fillip with expansion into newer verticals and geographies, including the Philippines, the IT services need better management, as Bhasin admits. ?We need to manage it better, there is no question about it. We brought an IT company in Europe previously (SAP Europe in 2007) and the on-site work there has not been strong. Moreover, Europe is doing slow.?

The firm also looks at the ?cloud? business model differently, which is primarily considered a contributor to IT services for any normal organisation. Though the company took a lot of initiatives in providing cloud as a service to its customers, Bhasin feels his focus will be more on using cloud as a service for its BPM business.

?If I provide IT related applications on cloud, it will be an IT services business. But there are already many people in this particular space and they are big. I am more interested in taking our BPO processes on the cloud.? he provides another undeniable argument.

Bhasin also feels the IT business and BPM will grow at different trajectories, as he now sees some pent up demand for the IT services business. In November last year, Genpact appointed Danford (Dan) Smith to a new position of senior vice-president and business leader, software services and global IT solutions business development. In this dual role, Smith will be the business leader for Genpact software services and the global business development leader for its IT solutions business, which encompasses IT services, software, and SAP Europe.

Analysing the behaviour of pure play global BPOs like Genpact, Saugata Sengupta, consultant at Tholons Investment Advisory, explains, ?Consolidated players (big IT companies with smaller BPO segments) offer much greater value in terms of combined IT/BPO deals. This has also prompted some of the pure play BPO players to shift focus from IT to BPO since the number of consolidated deals have significantly reduced due to risk mitigation factors. On the other hand, pure BPOs with a global presence and multiple skill sets are a very lucrative market to operate in.?

This is the opportunity that Genpact aims to seize. Though the company’s overall growth came down to 7.6% in 2009, it outlined an estimated growth of 12-13% in 2010. But Bhasin has bigger ambitions. ?We aim to reach pre-slowdown levels of 22-25% growth rate in the next two-three years,? he stresses. This seems achievable, especially in sectors like healthcare, as well as a whole range of services?call centre, F&A, analytics and procurement to large international automotive companies globally?all of which have garnered good gains for Genpact. Many clients also utilise Genpact?s KPO offerings.

Though Genpact has been slow on the acquisition front, Bhasin avers, ?This growth of 22-25% also includes acquisitions, for which analytics, banking, finance and accounting are good domains.? Incidentally, Genpact acquired Symphony Marketing Solutions last year to accelerate its business analytics and market research segment.