Infosys to mull returning money to shareholders, making more acquisitions

SINGAPORE/HONG KONG: Infosys, India’s second-largest software exporter, may consider returning money to shareholders and making acquisitions to utilise the biggest amount of cash among outsourcers in the south Asian country.
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“We will look at both,” co-founder S Gopalakrishnan said in an interview from Tianjin, China. “Periodically, we have been returning some of the cash through special dividends. And we will also look at acquisitions, but we don’t want to do an acquisition for an acquisition’s sake.”

The Bangalore-based company said earlier this week it agreed to buy Swiss management consulting company Lodestone Holding for $352 million in its biggest acquisition.

The purchase may help Infosys meet its goal of securing a third of its revenue from consulting and systems integration work amid rising competition in outsourcing from Tata Consultancy Services and International Business Machines Corp. Infosys had Rs 206 billion in cash and cash equivalents as of June 30, according to a company statement -- the most among Indian software developers.

Mumbai-based Tata Consultancy, India’s biggest software exporter, had Rs 96 billion in cash and short-term investments at the end of June.