Ranganath Mavinakere
Analyst · Joseph Foresi from Cantor Fitzgerald. Please go ahead
Thanks Salil and Pravin. Hello everyone. Before I go to the details of Q4 performance, let me step back and look at the overall performance of the company in fiscal '18. In fiscal '18, the company delivered good performance and resilience on multiple fronts, let me talk about a few key aspects of fiscal '18. First the annual growth of 7.2% in reported currency and 5.8% in constant currency and 3% in rupee terms was in the back of good growth in digital revenues. The digital revenues exceeded 25% of the total revenues of the company. Further, increased the number of $100 million client to 20. Second, our operating margins for the year was resilient at 24.3 driven by broad based improvement in several operational parameter, productivity improvement and automation benefit. Revenue per employee increased by 6.3% during the year and crossed $54,500. This was primarily driven by the fact that the revenue growth during the year was up than the headcount growth due to the higher utilization in productivity improvements. While revenue grew by 7.2%, the headcount growth was just 1.9%. Our operating margin for the year was above midpoint of our guided during this 23 to 25 at 24.3%. Our operating margin for the quarter improved by 40 basis points to 24.7 and we will be providing more color on this shortly. Third, our cash generation for the year was robust at $1947 million a growth of 15.3% as compared to 7.2% of revenue growth. Coming to capital allocation, during the year the company successfully executed the capital allocation policy that was announced in April 2017. As part of the policy the company completed successfully share buy back of up to $2 billion. Today the Board in its meeting reviewed and approved the capital allocation policy of the company after taking into account the strategic and operational cash requirements of the company in the medium term. The key aspects of the capital allocation policy are; one, the Board has decided to retain the current policy of returning up to 70% of the free cash flow of the corresponding financial year in such a manner as may be decided by the Board from time-to-time. In addition to the above, out of the cash balance in the balance sheet, the Board has identified an amount up to $2 billion to be paid to shareholders in the following manner. A) A special dividend of Rs. 10 per share resulting in a sales of approximately $400 million, B) The Board has identified an amount of up to approximately $1.6 billion to be paid out to shareholders for the financial year 2019 in such a manner to be decided by the Board subject to applicable laws. Further announcements in this regard to be made as appropriate in due course. Now let me talk about Q4 revenues. Our revenues in the quarter was $2805 million, this is a sequential growth of 1.8% in dollar terms, 0.6% in constant currency terms. In receipt terms the revenue for the quarter was 18,083 crores this is a sequential growth of 1.6%. At competitive Q4 of last year revenues grew 9.2% in dollar terms 6.4% in constant currency terms and 5.6% in the rupee terms. Let me talk about volume growth and price realization. Speaking to volume growth for the quarter was 1.1%. At competitive Q4 of last year, the year-on-year volume growth was 6.2%. Pricing realization for Q4 improved by 3.5% and year-on-year basis. For the full year as compared to fiscal 2017 which is a better indicator of price realization. The price realization improved by 1.5% in reported terms and by 0.2% in constant currency terms. We ended the quarter with a total headcount of 204,107 employees, which is a net increase of 2,416 from last quarter. In fiscal '18, the net headcount increased by 3,743 employees as compared to the net addition of over 6,000 employees in fiscal '17. Coming to operational efficiency, our relentless focus resulted in improvement of several efficiency parameters in fiscal '18. Utilization excluding trainees for the year, it will be 84.6% from 81.7% in the previous year. Similarly, our efforts towards moderation of onsite mix resulted in onsite mix decreasing to 29.3% this year. In Q4, this further reduced to 28.7%, which is the lowest level in 12 quarters. Our focus on optimizing on onsite employee cost including sharper focus on productivity, onsite pyramid and others, localization and cost optimization measures led to a decrease in the onsite employee cost as a percentage of revenue to 38.3% in fiscal '18 as compared to 30.7% in previous year. The subcontractor expenses this quarter stood at 6.1% of revenue and compared to 5.9% of revenue last quarter. As you know the subcontractor expenses have driven primarily by utilization levels and onsite talent demand. Our operation margin in Q4 was 24.7% which increased sequentially by 40 basis points currency movements helped the margin by 20 basis points which was fully offset by a drop in utilization and price realization. Further, reduction in onsite mix and other expenses improved by the margin by 70 basis points, this was partly offset by higher variable pay and increase in compensation cost by 30 basis points. So overall this led to an improvement of 40 basis points sequentially. Cash generated from operating activities in Q4 as per IFRS consolidated was $550 million and we paid US$74 million of taxes as per the APA entered into the United States IRS. Free cash flow which is operating cash flow less CapEx for the quarter was $418 million. For the full year, fiscal '18 free cash flow was robust and increased by 15.3% as compared to the revenue growth of 17.2%. Cash and cash equivalents including investment to debt $4873 million which converts to approximately Rs. 131,765 crores. For fiscal 2018, the Board announced a final dividend of 20.5 shares after including the interim dividend of 13 per share the aggregate dividend for fiscal '18 amounts to Rs. 33.5 per share. The total pay amounts for approximately 70% of free cash flow for the financial year, which is in line with the capital allocation policy announced by the company in April 2017. Day sales outstanding for the quarter decreased by three days to 67 days compared to 70 days last quarter. After expenditure for the quarter was $97 million, which is Rs. 624 crores. Yield on cash for the quarter was 7.29% as compared to 6.9% last quarter slight improvement in the yield. Our hedge position as of March 31, was $1513 million. In fiscal '18, the EPS growth was strong at 17.8%, EPS for the year was 1.1 and this includes positive impact of $0.09 on account APA, which was calculated with the United States IRS during the year. In the quarter ended March 31, 2018, on conclusion of the strategic review offers the portfolio of businesses, the company initiated identification and evaluation of potential buyers for its subsidiary Kallidus, Skava and Panaya. On such reclassification an impairment loss of 18 million in the aspect of Panaya has been recognized in the consolidated profit and loss for the quarter and year ended March 31, 2018. The corresponding write-down in the investment value of Panaya in the standalone financial statement of Infosys Limited is $90 million. Coming to operating margin guidance for fiscal '19, we guide operating margins in the range of 22% to 24%. This is primarily an account of focused investments in digital to leverage digital opportunity in under invested areas, enhancing our investments in U.S. talent models further to foolproof our future business, revitalizing sales for swapping market opportunities and repurposing of talent. At the same time as in the last year, we continue our relentless focus on productivity, operational efficiency and cost optimization while focusing on digital growth. With that, we open the floor for questions.