India’s Hexaware targets public sector business as it expands UK operation

Range of clients

TCS already provides services to the Department of Work and Pensions, public sector organisation pension provider Nest, the Department for Education, the BBC and Cardiff City Council in local government.

Infosys and Wipro are other examples of Indian heritage suppliers seeking public sector opportunities in the UK.

Hexaware’s UK customers today include Yorkshire Water, insurance company Liverpool Victoria and Lloyds Banking Group, but only about 5% of its overall UK business is with public sector organisations.

Speaking to Computer Weekly on the announcement of a new office in Canary Wharf, Amrinder Singh, head of EMEA and APAC operations at Hexaware, said the company is still in the “discovery phase” in relation to UK public sector work.

But when asked whether the UK public sector is more open to Indian suppliers, he said: “This is a trend we are seeing in the market, absolutely, that they are, and for a variety of reasons.

“We feel that the need for efficiency through technology in public sector is actually quite acute,” added Singh. “Also, in the past, the public sector has been overtly reliant on some large players. How large you are and how long you have worked in the public sector counts a lot.”

Fujitsu, one of the UK government’s biggest IT supplies, is currently facing huge challenges retaining business due to its much-publicised role in the Post Office scandal. Singh sees this and the struggles of other suppliers as an opportunity.

Like with TCS, the addition of public sector work will mean Hexaware’s UK workforce will increase. Out of its global staff count of about 30,000, only 650 are currently in the UK.

But the supplier’s workforce will look far different by 2030 if its self-imposed target to have half of all work delivered by artificial intelligence (AI) workers is reached. “One of the vision statements that we have is that by 2030 we want nearly 50% of our work to be delivered and revenue to be generated through digital labour, not just human labour,” Singh told Computer Weekly.

This does not mean the human workforce will be smaller, with the growth of the company meaning more will be needed, but he admitted the growth of the human workforce may slow down

Humans will also be trained to ensure they can get the best out of AI, with almost the entire human workforce to be trained and certified in the technology. “We said that there is no future for single-skilled people,” he said. “Unless you are multi-skilled with domain understanding, as well as understanding how to use AI and technology, you will not survive.”

Hexaware has provided what Singh described as a “playground” for staff to experiment with AI. Known as bottom-up disruption, the initiative will tap staff domain experience and give them freedom to “identify areas in which they would like bring automation and AI to our customers”.

“Every employee is given a mandate to identify certain areas in which they would like to work on commissions if they have great ideas,” said Singh. “There are some hackathons and staff get a fast-track career path where they can also be part of our innovation team, not just delivery team.”