The current economic slowdown has forced Wipro to delay the opening of a new US development centre.

The company had planned to establish a near-shore centre in Atlanta, Georgia. The facility was slated to provide technical training and sponsor higher education degrees for up to 40 per cent of its employees.

"We are not shying away from what we plan to do in Atlanta, but it is taking more time than expected given this scenario," explained Sridhar Ramasubbu, CFO of Wipro America.

Wipro currently maintains seven development centres throughout the United States. Approximately 8,500 of Wipro’s 97,552 employees operate in America, including those working onsite at customer locations.

Despite the above-mentioned delay, Wipro has managed to defy a global economic downturn by recording 17 per cent annual growth.

"For the quarter ended September 2008, we delivered an excellent performance with IT Services revenues at $1,110 million, significantly ahead of our guidance of $1,089 million. Our differentiated Service lines of Technology Infrastructure Services, Testing Services and Package Implementation continue to show good growth. Our leadership in India & Middle East business was further re-emphasized with another quarter of strong year on year growth. We won six multi-year multi-million dollar deals during the quarter," said Wipro Chairman, Azim Premji, Chairman said.

As IT Examiner previously reported, the Middle East has evolved into a lucrative market for Indian IT companies attempting to reduce their dependence on the US.

"The US accounts for almost 76 per cent of India's total IT exports, but with the slowdown in the US economy, it is very important that we look at alternatives to diversify the basket," explained Sunil Vachani, vice-chairman of the Electronics and Computer Software Export Promotion Council (ESC) of India.

It should be noted that Azim Premji recently proposed that his company "invest in the right opportunities," including lucrative Middle East markets.  X

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