Bangalore, Jan 21 (IANS) Software major Wipro Ltd Friday said revenue from its global IT business for the Jan-March fourth quarter of this fiscal would be $1.4 billion, projecting a sequential growth of four percent over the Oct-Dec third quarter.

‘We expect revenues from our IT services business to be about $1.4 billion, a sequential growth of four percent,’ Wipro chief financial officer Suresh Senapaty told reporters while announcing the company’s performance in the third quarter of this fiscal.

As the flagship division of the IT bellwether, the global IT services and products division achieved its revenue guidance of $1.3 billion for the third quarter, registering year-on-year (YoY) growth of 15 percent and 5.6 percent sequentially from the second quarter of $1.2 billion.

In rupee terms, the revenue is Rs.5,949 crore (Rs.59.5 billion).

The operating margins, however, remained sequentially flat at 22.2 percent and 1.5 percent lower YoY.

‘The operating margins for IT services business was flat despite lower working days and drop in utilisaiton,’ Senapty said on the occasion.

Recovering from the tech meltdown of the previous fiscal (2009-10), the company posted net profit of Rs.13.2 billion for the third quarter, registering 10 percent YoY growth and revenue of Rs.7,829 crore (Rs.78.3 billion), an increase of 12 percent YoY.

Under the International Financial Regulatory System (IFRS), net income is $294 million and revenue $1.75 billion.

The IT services business added 36 new clients and 3,591 employees during the quarter, taking the total headcount to 119,491 at the end of December.

The company also announced a change of guard at the top, with eco energy division chief executive T.K. Kurien taking over as the new chief executive of the IT business from February 1 in place of the joint chief executives Girish Paranjpe and Suresh Vaswani, who have decided to step down and leave the organisation March 31.

‘The joint chief executive structure was one of the key factors that successfully helped us navigate the worst economic crisis of our times,’ Wipro chairman Azim Premji said in a statement here.

Paranjpe and Vaswani have been associated with the company over the last two decades and have been an integral part of the leadership team.

‘There is a change in environment, there is a need for a simpler organization structure. Kurien’s track record with customers, passion for excellence, coupled with strategic thinking and rigour in execution make him uniquely positioned to lead Wipro through the next phase of growth,’ Premji observed.