A consulting firm
based in India is taking aim at Canada’s financial services industry. Satyam Computer Services Ltd., a Pradesh-based outsourcing giant that is already a supplier here, plans to expand in Canada and serve clients in the U.S. and other markets through its new locations.

“Canada is a very attractive destination for us to service global markets in the U.S.,” says executive director Ram Mynampati.

Satyam already supplies clients in retail banking, capital markets, investment banking, insurance and at stock exchanges. It offers a range of services to banks, including back-office processing of credit card and consumer-banking transactions. Mynampati says the firm has some of Canada’s Big Five banks among its clients, but declines to name them.

Satyam also handles transactions and annuities for insurance companies and, on the investment industry side, provides a number of back-office services for investment-management firms as well as transaction processing for stock exchanges.

“We deal with the entire life cycle of activities in investment banking settlements,” Mynampati says. The company also develops portfolio-management software.

The financial services industry accounts for 29% of total revenue, while that business brings in 50% of the revenue from Canada.

Satyam has 500 employees serving Canadian clients, 150 of whom are in Canada, mostly working at the main office in Mississauga, Ont. There are locations in Montreal and Calgary, with plans to open an office in Vancouver.

Satyam’s biggest competitors in Canada are global systems integrators, such as CGI Group Inc., Accenture Ltd. and IBM Corp., says Satyam vice president Gary Teelucksingh in Toronto: “Those are the companies we compete with because they are trying to do what we are doing, as far as global development is concerned.”

Other competition comes from similar India-based firms vying for the same business in Canada.

“We are the fourth-largest [Indian outsourcing firm], and there are three more companies that we compete with in Canada,” Teelucksingh says. “And Satyam, at this point, has the largest footprint of any of the Indian providers here in Canada — particularly the biggest presence in the financial services sector.”

Satyam’s strategy is to expand services as clients’ needs grow. The firm has observed that, as customers expand geographically, they demand services in new regions. “So a customer in the U.S. expanding into Canada, given the intimacy we have built with that customer, would also look at us delivering the same services to their operations in Canada,” says Mynampati.

Satyam lists eight of the world’s top 10 investment banking companies and two of the top five automakers among its client roster, says Mynampati.

“The quality of clientele is significantly high for us today,” he says. “As we build expertise, we find that the same expertise can be useful in other markets. So, we are able to deliver to Canadian financial institutions many of the solutions that we’re delivering to banks in the U.S. It is a natural way of extending our reach, as far as building services for other markets.”

The plan is to do more business for Canadian clients and serve foreign clients, particularly those in the U.S., from the Canadian locations. The company calls the concept “near shore” delivery — the middle ground between providing service in the client’s locale and outsourcing to India.

A firm based in the U.S., for example, might find it more economical to outsource some services to Satyam’s Canadian operations than to India. “Companies that want significant cost savings but still need to have services delivered from the same time zone and with the same intimacy, as far as a cultural fit is concerned, are far more receptive to hiring services from closer to home,” Mynampati says.

Satyam is a large company by any standards. It employs 33,000 people in 55 countries and does well above $1 billion in annual revenue. The firm is not exactly a newcomer to the Canadian financial services market. It began selling services 12 years ago through a local company called Softgen.

“When we got to a stage at which we found that we had enough scale to sustain ourselves, we acquired that company,” Mynampati says.

That was five years ago. Since then, Satyam has stepped up its presence by adding people and locations, and it has made a substantial financial commitment. Teelucksingh declines to reveal just how much the firm has invested in its Canadian operation, but says: “We will do whatever is required in scaling up our operations to where we feel we have a significant share of the market.”

@page_break@The firm is trying to raise its profile by meeting with organizations and participating in industry events. For example, Satyam will be a silver sponsor at the Canadian Investment Awards, to be held in Toronto on Nov. 30. IE