TCS, Wipro, HP in race for CMC

TCS, Wipro, HP in race for CMC
AGENCIES

NEW DELHI, APRil 3: Leading IT companies Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Wipro and Hewlett Packard (HP) besides a host of other global players have bid for picking up a controlling stake from the government in IT giant CMC. “Three infotech companies TCS, Wipro and HP have submitted Expression of Interest (EoI) for picking up government’s stake in CMC,” sources said. The government decided to offload 57.3 per cent stake in the company to a combination of a strategic partners, employees and others.

Yet another submission has been received from Delhi-based Saiinfo Ltd and UK-based Saiinfo Plc which have thrown their hats into the ring to become strategic partner in CMC by bidding jointly.

Disinvestment Ministry officials dubbed the response as ‘good’ but declined to give the number of bids and the names of aspirants. “We feel that CMC has a good resource pool and has developed expertise in various facets of IT. With Saiinfo’s core focus on application software, development, training and overseas placement, we feel that synergy resulting from the combined expertise would help consolidate and enhance our strengths,” B C Rastogi, chairman of Saiinfo said.

TCS, HP and Wipro could, however, not be contacted for comments.

In a bid to expedite the privatisation of CMC, an interministerial meeting was held today at the disinvestment ministry to chalk out a tentative programme for selling government’s stake, possibly during the second quarter of the current fiscal.

The meeting was attended among others by Disinvestment Secretary Pradeep Baijal, officials of IT ministry and CMC. The government had, on February 1, 2001, announced the disinvestment of CMC to bring down its stake from 83 per cent to 26 per cent.

The move was aimed at helping the company to gear up for the global competition in the information technology sector and the final shareholding pattern was to be decided after consultation between the strategic partner and the employees.

As per the preliminary information memorandum (PIM), companies interested in participating in the disinvestment should have a net worth of not less than Rs 300 crore.

It has also incorporated a clause requiring strategic partner to make a public offer for acquiring further shares in accordance with Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) guidelines.