C Chitti Pantulu

Hyderabad: In line with the trend set by IT bellwether TCS and Infy, Satyam BPO (formerly Nipuna) is on the verge of closing in on a "carve-out" acquisition of a customer's KPO operations.

"We are on track to announce the acquisition before the current financial year runs out," Sax Krishna, global head, strategy & corporate development, Satyam BPO, told DNA Money.

The carve-out acquisitions trend was set up TCS when executed the Pearl BPO acquisition in 2005 and more recently by Infosys when it acquired the BPO operations of Philips for $25 million.

"There are many opportunities out there and we love carve-outs," Krishna said in an interview adding the company was also looking for medium and niche acquisitions in the healthcare and banking and financial services space. Typically these would be ranging anywhere between 50-100 people in the KPO area and between 500-1,000 in the healthcare space, he added.

Given the nature of the segment the deal likely to be announced along with the Q4 numbers of the company in April, is unlikely to be huge where numbers go but it will be of significant importance given the space the KPO will be into. Krishna, however, refused to divulge either the name of the customer nor the size of the deal.

Carveouts are ideal given that they carry lesser risks for both parties and conducive to continuing a relationship and assured revenues, he explained.

Satyam BPO,which posted revenues of $15 million and is projected to closed FY08 at $61 million, has 33 customers across four core verticals like healthcare, insurance and pharma, banking and financial services,manufacturing and automotive, and media and telecom.

Some of Nipuna's largest clients include BellSouth, Merrill Lynch, Bear Sterns & Co, Caterpillar Corp and Glaxo-SmithKline.

Satyam BPO has a current headcount of 4,000 people, which is likely to more than double by March 2009, according to earlier projections by the company.

Meanwhile, Satyam BPO is preparing to kick off operations in countries like Brazil, Canada, Philippines, and Egypt keeping in line with customer demands, Krishan said.

While the company has limited operations from customer premises in Belgium and US, this will be the first time Satyam will set up standalone BPO operations overseas.

Each of these set up could anywhere upwards of 250 plus people in size and mostly likely to service customers in the pharma, telecom and map digitisation areas.

The overseas rollout would begin by around July-August with a view to leverage availability of multi-lingual, multiskill and cost advantages of these locations, he added.

"Some customers want us to set up operations elsewhere outside the US and we are seriously setting the process in motion," he said.

Source : DNA