In the last one year, four major IT companies appointed new Australia heads. The growing importance of the Australian market, although with a different set of challenges as compared to Western markets or other markets of Asia Pacific region, is making Indian IT companies take stock of the region in a strategic manner.
On Tuesday, HCLTech appointed Sonia Eland as executive vice president and country manager for Australia and New Zealand with effect from April 1, 2024. In her new role, Eland will report to Swapan Johri, president, growth markets at HCLTech.
Last month, Mohit Joshi, MD and CEO designate, Tech Mahindra, said during the quarterly earnings, “We have consolidated our Asia Pacific and Japan businesses under a single leader, who will be based in Australia.” The company has consolidated its telecom and non-telecom businesses in the APJ (Asia Pacific Japan) region.
The company is seeing Harshvendra Soin relocating to Australia to lead a consolidated Asia Pacific and Japan unit. Soin, the chief people officer and global marketing head of Indian IT consulting and services giant Tech Mahindra, is set to relocate to Australia to lead the freshly merged Asia Pacific and Japan practice.
Coforge in February this year appointed Rahul Girotra as senior vice president and head – Australia and New Zealand. Similarly, Wipro last November appointed Christopher Smith as the managing director for Australia and New Zealand (A/NZ). Smith joined from Telstra, where he was the group owner of Telstra Purple, the largest Australian-owned technology services company.
With the margins in Asia Pacific lower than western markets, analysts say Australia, an English speaking country, is a better market as far as pricings are concerned. Some of the IT companies, because of margin headwinds, have also been diluting their businesses in Asia Pacific region that comes under their RoW (rest of the world) geographical segment.