Infosys mulls setting up marketplace for clients, staff

Infosys, India’s second largest IT services company, is planning to set up a marketplace where its employees can get access to short-term projects primarily for internal works, which may eventually be opened up for clients.

The proposal, which is in ideation stage, can be perceived as the next step in IT services delivery wherein resources can work on interesting short-term projects and clients may not have to go through the hassles of a sales process.

On Thursday, while addressing analysts, Infosys’s CEO and MD Vishal Sikka gave a hint of how the company is planning to move in this direction.

“Much of sales for our kind of business can be made automatic. We can create marketplaces where at least long standing existing customers can directly work with our employees on creating project teams,” he said, adding that the company has already started work in this direction.

According to company sources, Infosys already has an internal portal called 'MyWorks' where the company posts its internal IT requirements, primarily for unbilled resources, who are typically known as bench staff. By working on such projects, the performance of these people gets evaluated.

As a logical progression, it is now looking at putting out the short-term project requirements of clients, not just for the bench staff but for all its employees.

The next step is to open it up for the clients where they themselves can put up their project requirements on the portal and can pick up the team. This system is an ideation stage now.

“To come to a point where the clients will be able put up their requirements in the portal is the ultimate thing. We don’t have any working model as of now to make this,” senior sources in the company said.

According to sources, putting internal IT requirements for people on the bench already works. Once it is opened to all the employees, learning of newer technologies could be one of the attraction points.

“The whole purpose is, the person who may be working on some old technology or simple stuff, he will want to work on new technologies. For such people, this will be a great opportunity. But what financial benefit they may have is something which is being evaluated,” the person added.

Employees, who are working on some projects, can only do it in their spare time. “In the sense, they can finish the client commitment and whatever extra time they have, they can work beyond that period.”

As of September 30, 2014, Infosys has 165,411 employees on its rolls including those from its subsidiaries.