IT Services Industry

IT services industry

Is cash still the king?

IT companies in India have always been cash-rich. Large-cap IT services companies analysed However, over the last few years, as the sector has matured and in the absence of any significant • Tata Consultancy Services investment opportunities, IT companies have increased • Infosys the cash return to investors by way of dividends and share buybacks. • Wipro In this publication, we have evaluated the capital • HCL Technologies allocation strategy adopted by large and mid-cap Indian • Tech Mahindra IT companies in the last three years to assess how the cash positon of these companies has changed. These publicly listed IT services companies analysed Mid-cap IT services companies analysed constitute more than 90% market cap of the overall • Mphasis Indian IT services industry. • Mindtree • Hexaware Technologies • Persistent Systems • Zensar Technologies • Larsen & Turbo Infotech

Industry closing net cash balance (USD Cash as a percentage of market cap (%)*^ billion)* 12% 20.0 10% 16.7 10% 15.7 14.5 8% 8% 15.0 13.0 8% 7%

6% 10.0 4% 5.0 2%

0.0 0% FY 2016 FY 2017 FY 2018 FY 2019 FY 2016 FY 2017 FY 2018 FY 2019

*Net cash = Cash + Short-term investments - Debt *Net Cash = Cash + Short-term investments - Debt ^Represents weighted average percentages based on market cap weights

• Despite significant buybacks and dividends, the absolute net cash position has remained fairly stable and has increased in FY2019. • This implies that companies are not eating into the cash existing on the balance sheet and are primarily using the cash generated in a particular year for the payouts. • However, net cash as a percentage of market cap has shown a downward trend in the last three years with cash balance now constituting only 7% of the total market cap.

1.4 1.2 9.2 1.2 1.0

0.8 0.7 13.0 0.6 0.4 0.4 0.3 0.2 0.1 0.0 - FY 2017 FY 2018 FY 2019

Acquistions Divestments *Opening cash balance = Cash + Short-term investments - Debt *Payouts = Dividend + Buybacks *”Acquisitions” indicates gross acquisition and does not include divestments *Others = Operating cash flow including other cash flows

• FY 2019 witnessed an increase in divestment activities, especially by Wipro, in an effort to streamline the core business of IT services companies. This has also resulted in an increase in the cash balance. • While the last three years did not have any mega deals, the focus was mainly on acquiring smaller companies to strengthen some specific capabilities of the IT services companies. Cash balance is likely to come down in FY 2020 due to HCL’s acquisition of IBM’s software products, which is the largest acquisition by an Indian IT company till date. • Buyback is lower in FY 19 than in FY 18, implying toning down of return of capital by IT services companies. However, as per recent management commentary, these companies are expected to continue returning cash to their investors. For example, TCS has a capital return policy of 80%-100% of free cash flows, for Infosys it is 80% of free cash flows and for HCL it is 50%-60% of net income.

4 ©2019 Grant Thornton India LLP. All rights reserved. Which company is returning the most to its investors? Percentage returned to investors* 14% 12% 12% 9% 10% 8% 9% 8% 6% 5% 6% 6% 6% 5% 4% 4% 4% 4% 3% 3% 4% 3% 2% 2% 2%3% 2% 3% 3% 2% 2% 2% 2% 2% 2% 1% 2% 0.4% 1% 1% 0% Mphasis Infosys TCS Wipro HCL Mindtree Hexaware Tech L&T Infotech Persistent Zensar Mahindra Systems

FY 2017 FY 2018 FY 2019 *Returned to investors = (Dividend + Buyback)/Opening market cap *The graph has been presented in descending order based on the average of three years’ percentage returned to investors

Which company has spent the most proportion of its cash on acquisitions?

8.0% 6.8% Percentage used for acquisitions** 7.0% 6.0% 5.0% 4.0% 3.0% 2.7% 3% 2% 3.0% 1.9% 2% 2.0% 1.5% 0.9% 1.0% 1% 0.9% 0.9% 0.4% 1.0% 0.2% 0% 0% 0% 0.3% 0%0% 0.2% 0% 0% 0.3% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0% 0.0% 0% 0% Zensar Tech HCL Wipro L&T Infotech Persistent Mphasis Mindtree Infosys Hexaware TCS Mahindra Systems

FY 2017 FY 2018 FY 2019 **Used for Acquisitions = Acquisitions/Opening market cap **The graph has been presented in descending order based on the average of three years’ percentage used for acquisitions

Net cash balances (USD billion) - Large cap* Net cash balances (USD billion) - Mid cap* 0.5 8.0 6.9 6.2 0.4 7.0 0.4 6.0 0.3 5.3 5.0 5.0 0.3 5.0 4.3 4.0 4.1 0.3 0.3 0.2 4.0 4.0 3.1 0.2 0.1 2.7 2.3 0.2 0.1 0.1 0.1 3.0 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 0.1 2.0 0.1 0.05 0.1 0.04 0.5 0.6 0.4 1.0 0.1 0.04 0.03 0.04 1.0 0.19 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.02 - - TCS Infosys Wipro HCL Tech Mahindra Mphasis Mindtree Hexaware Persistent L&T Infotech Zensar Systems

FY 2016 FY 2017 FY 2018 FY 2019 FY 2016 FY 2017 FY 2018 FY 2019

FY19 market cap (USD billion) - Large cap FY19 market cap (USD billion) - Mid cap 4.3 150.0 108.3 5.0 4.0 100.0 2.7 3.0 2.2 46.5 1.5 50.0 22.1 21.3 9.9 2.0 0.7 0.8 1.0 - - TCS Infosys Wipro HCL Tech Mphasis Mindtree Hexaware Persistent L&T Infotech Zensar Mahindra Systems

25% 22% Closing cash/Market cap (%)* 18% 16% 20% 14% 12% 12%13% 15% 9% 10% 11% 11% 10% 10% 9% 9% 7% 7% 7% 7% 9% 8% 7% 10% 5% 6% 6% 6% 5% 5% 5% 5% 3% 2% 3% 3% 0% Wipro Mphasis Persistent Infosys L&T Infotech Tech Mahindra Mindtree TCS Hexaware Zensar HCL Systems

FY 2017 FY 2018 FY 2019 *Net cash = Cash + Short-term investments - Debt *The graph has been presented in descending order based on the average of three-year closing cash/market cap percentage

• Even after returning capital to their investors, IT companies still have sufficient cash reserves to continue acquiring in order to gain digital capabilities and new-age technologies or diversify into engineering and R&D domains, similar to CapGemini’s acquisition of Altran. • However, in the mid to long term, the appetite for larger acquisitions may come down if the companies continue the pace of their cash payout to the shareholders. • It is interesting to note that out of the companies analysed, Mphasis has returned the most cash to investors as a proportion of total available cash balance. • Wipro’s cash balance has actually increased in 2019 in terms of the percentage of market cap, due to divestments and sharp fall in the payouts in 2019. • Among all the companies that we have analysed, Zensar has spent the maximum proportion of its available cash balance on acquisition.

S&P Capital IQ database

Annual fillings of IT services companies

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