TCS Spending More Money Via Work From Home Model; Only 25% TCS Staff Will Come To Office!

As per the reports, Tata Sons chairman N Chandrasekaran, pointing out that employees working from home during the nationwide lockdown was not a cost-saving measure for Tata Consultancy Services (TCS).

In reality, it added to expenses, said the IT services provider had already signed long-term leases for its offices.

What Does TCS Say?

During the annual general meeting, Chandrasekaran told shareholders at Tata Consultancy Services, “It is not being done for cost reasons. In fact, TCS has long term leases, so currently it is all investment and more expenses,”.

This was the first virtual gathering of stakeholders by any Indian corporation. Here Tata Sons is the parent entity of TCS.

He said, “This (work from home arrangement) is something that has happened suddenly and TCS has not seen it as a temporary measure. TCS has not responded to it (Covid-19) as a stop-gap arrangement. TCS can only see and gauge what the trend is going to be. So, we are seeing this as a trend and are making significant investments,”.

What About Opportunities To Acquire Companies?

While, in response to questions on the software services exporter’s healthy cash reserves and opportunities to acquire companies at cheap valuations, Chandrasekaran said, “There are no plans of acquisition at this stage. We study every single acquisition opportunity but, as we have always said, we have to be disciplined in terms of looking at acquisitions. We don’t just acquire for the sake of revenues,”.

Instead of acquiring companies, he said there was “tremendous opportunity for TCS to continue to build the business across various segments.”

The Chief Executive Officer Rajesh Gopinathan said the company had generated “unprecedented” payouts to shareholders since the financial year 2016, in his address to shareholders.

Gopinathan said, “Over the last five years, we have distributed Rs 112,422 crore cumulatively in the form of dividends and buybacks to our shareholders. This is unprecedented and unsurpassed by any other company in corporate India,”.

Prior to this, TCS declared a dividend of Rs 6 per share, taking its dividend total for the financial year 2020 to Rs 73 per equity share, which included four interim as well as a special dividend.

Further, the total payout in the year stood at Rs 31,895 crore.

A majority of employees at India’s top three IT companies continue to work from home despite the unlock kick off on Monday, as companies prioritize safety and open their facilities in a staggered manner.

So far, over 95% of TCS employees continue to work from home, 97% of Wipro employees are currently working from home. 

On the other hand, Infosys said 2% of its workforce started working from offices in phase-1 and this percentage would now be in the range of 5-6% in phase 2.