Infosys employs an ever-expanding army of low-cost but highly educated Indian engineers and attracts the best of the best by offering relatively high salaries and significant perks. It is creative in the way it sources talent, drawing on the top graduates from smaller colleges. Many employees have less than 3 years experience which, given their ability and intellectual rigour, allows the company to provide its clients with a very cost-effective, yet efficient service

Some have argued that Infosys should focus on greater intellectual property creation and move beyond a conventional service model where payment is largely made for time and material inputs. They see an opportunity to move to payment for outputs, the basis of gains that their IT services can deliver. Perhaps they will: it is noticeable that Infosys’s Software Engineering and Technology Labs which spearhead the company’s commitment to innovation and Intellectual Property development, generated over 80 invention disclosures and filed over 20 patents in 2007.

More significantly in terms of its value chain, Infosys is moving into higher value-adding services such as establishing an R&D partnership to jointly create next-generation solutions for the power sector with ALSTOM, a global leader in power generation and rail transport infrastructure.

Its canny ability to see change and adapt to it means that Infosys is keeping ahead of the game. As it has quickly migrated from support service to value-creating software development and outsourced R&D, it has consistently been able to compete with the likes of Accenture and IBM and pre-empt new developments. For example, it has opened offices in China and Mexico to counter the wage inflation and skills shortage it is facing in India and is mitigating the possible threat of competition from other developing countries. It is also now considering acquisition and, as several other Indian firms in recent years have done, there have been rumours that it will acquire a large European firm to further underpin its future global growth ambitions.

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