Capgemini feels business sentiment is upbeat in sectors such as telco, financial services and retail. The 8 billion-euro company will hire 15,000 by the year end. Capgemini India CEO Baru Rao tells FE?s Goutam Das that the company?s is currently keeping a close watch on economic recovery. Excerpts:

Economic recovery in the US is losing steam. Can we expect double dip recession?

I don?t think we are seeing trends of a double dip economy as we speak. The way customers are behaving in issuing RFPs and dealing with discretionary spend, doesn?t point to any fear. However, we are closely watching the public sector space where we have 28% of business. We will watch what the government spend direction is going to be. But in the case of telco, financial services and retail the mood seems to be upbeat. We will know actual retail status once we hit the festive season.

The UK is revisiting all IT contracts. What about the rest of Europe?

We have to be prepared to deal with demanding customers, both in terms of value and price. At this point, there is no indication from governments that they want to talk about price reductions. But how things will pan out in the next few months is anybody?s guess.

Will offshoring increase considering that the recovery remains muted?

It depends on the industry. In segments like technology, financial services and retail it could certainly increase. In public, defence, and government we could see a defensive approach to offshoring and that?s where multinational companies have an advantage. When they outsource to us, we don?t have to necessarily offshore. Lot of the work can happen from remote locations within the country and governments are far more open to it.

How are you tapping the offshore leverage India provides?

The growth in India is far ahead of other countries. This year we will end up recruiting over 15,000 people. We are increasing our offshore leverage wherever possible and also trying to building templates and tools.

It appears to be the highest number Capgemini has ever recruited in the country…

Customers in large deals would like to get a cost leverage by using offshore. Second, whenever there is a global customer who has used India for any procurement gets familiar with outsourcing and the country. So not using India doesn?t seem to be an option. Third, is our ability to scale the talent, collapse the calendar time, and introduce innovation. India is a natural choice.

How is the India business shaping up?

We have 40 customers. We are working in consulting, technology and on domestic outsourcing. We are seeing growth of 45% in the business and will be profitable by the year end.