Wipro on Friday said it expects sustained growth for the quarter ending March 31, 2003.

Azim Premji, chairman of Wipro commenting on the results for the quarter said, "We see sustained volume growth with prices stabilizing in IT services and growing volumes and with intense price competition in the IT enabled services. Our 10% sequential revenue growth in global IT services business was the result of an 8% volume growth and a 2% increase in price realizations. In the IT Enabled services segment, intense price competition resulted in revenues of $11.6 million for the quarter ended December 31, 2002 against our estimate of approximately $12.5 million.

"Enhanced operational efficiency contributed to a 4% increase in operating margin to revenue of 25%, negating the 4% decline in price realization that we saw during the quarter in this segment.

"For the quarter ended March 2003, we estimate the revenue in our global IT services business to be approximately $162 million, in Wipro Spectramind to be about $12 million and in Wipro HealthScience at approximately $2.5 million."

Vivek Paul, vice chairman and chief executive of Wipro Technologies, the company's global IT services business said, "Our Enterprise business which contributes 62% of our IT services revenue grew sequentially by 14%, reflecting the strong value proposition of domain based business solutions to our clients.

"Our technology business grew 4% sequentially reflecting our technical depth and commitment to our technology customers who continue to experience economic and business pressure.

"In the environment of intense price pressure in IT enabled services space, our operational excellence and experience continues to provide us with a compelling competitive advantage."

BSE Code: 507685