Infosys – Company Synopsis

Number of Employees: 67,000

Company Structure: Infosys has several Development Centers (DCs) spread mostly across South India. All the development centers have their own campuses are full with all kind of facilities. The company is divided into several IBUs(Integrated Business Units), for example there are separate IBUs for dealing with retail, banking, telecom, insurance companies. There is separate IBU for Finacle(a banking product by Infy), Enterprise Solutions( it handles all Oracle/SAP/Peoplesoft projects). All the IBUs may not be present in all the Development Centers.

Major source of revenue: Major revenue comes from software services which includes maintenance of IT systems of big companies (like IT operations of a company like DHL), migration projects which involve upgrading new software packages for its clients (switching from Oracle to DB2), implementation of packages (like implementing Oracle/SAP CRM solutions for a big retail company).

Nature of work: Work could be customization of a package for any client, testing of packages, development of new modules for client, customer support work for clients.
It could be like learning a tool that is being used by banks for maintaining/analyzing their data.

Skills required: You don’t require much of technical skills you never have to code from scratch; the need is to understand about the project you get. If you understand the requirement of the client and the domain you are working on, your job is going to be cakewalk. But most of the real life IT systems are huge and learning them takes time of around 3-4 months.

Hiring Strategy: Infosys hires employees with average and consistent academic background. For experienced persons the criteria may depend on the demand for that particular skill. The written test for freshers consists of easy puzzles from books like Shakuntala Devi. They might look for average communication skills apart from knowledge of English.

Positive highlights of the company:
Campus: Infosys campuses have all the things you can ask for in this modern day world.
Gym, swimming pool, food court, everything.

Location:
Banglore(20000+), Hyderabad(6500+), Pune, Mysore, Mangalore, Bhubaneswar(2000+), Trivandrum, Mohali.

Company Blog: http://www.infosysblogs.com/

Company Website: http://www.infosys.com/

Infosys

For a change some nice posts about Infosys!

Read about Abhinav Viswambharan’s experience at Infy here: link

A small excerpt

Our project is 3 years old, we have 32 people in our team out of which 13 people are at onsite now,i.e. at various US locations of our client – a ‘US telecom service provider’. We maintain the billing software of our client. In fact every day we connect to our client’s network at US through VPN-Virtual Private Network. One unique thing is that Infy works for its client almost 24hours a day, 5 days a week. Thats because when its 9am here, its 930pm at onsite, so when we enter office our Onsite friends leave, and when we move out at night, they start working. So, Indian IT companies have a big advantage on that front. Sounds cool na….. All seniors in our project are very cool, we are not supposed to call anyone Sir or Madam at Infy, its against the company culture. Work wise life is not very hectic. I just do some scripting in Unix & run some PL/SQL queries, thats it. Not much work, as of now, dont know about the future.

Regarding Infy Bangalore campus, its just awesome. 48 buildings, with over 19 thousand people working at one single campus, and as of now its the single largest IT campus in the entire world, in terms the number of people working out of it.

Another link about Infy

The buildings rocks. We’ve all the facilities over here. Supermarket, ATM, Salon, Hospital, Multiplex, Food Courts, Book Shop, Laundry and many more. And the recreation section is awesome. Tennis, Badminton, Football, Cricket (Venkitesh Prasad was here two days back), Volleyball, Basketball, Bowling, Table Tennis, Billiards, Snooker, Swimming Pool, Carroms and many more. I haven’t finished visiting all the places. The only probs is that We’ll not be getting enough time to enjoy all these once core training is started.

Infosys

Brand value, Career growth and onsite opportunities?
GOOD BRAND VALUE, CAREER GROWTH IS SLOWING DOWN, TOO SLOW AS YOU GROWABOVE PROJECT MANAGER, ONSITE IS HUGE

How is work environment and how efficient is the communication b/wteams or department?
VERY GOOD WORK ENV. AND GOOD COMMUNICATION

Work pressure/Work – life balance.
DECENT, BETTER THEN WIPRO

Satisfaction with salary and quality of work.
SALARY TOO LOW, QUALITY OF WORK IS LOW

What type of work they do: Product development, Services etc. Or if mix of these then what at percent?
MAINTENANCE

Job security.GOOD, EVEN IN TECH MELT DOWN, NONE WAS FIRED

Do you recommend your company to others? Yes or No and Why?
FOR AVG. COLLEGE JUNTA YES,IF YOU ARE A IIT / NIT GRAD NO

Vital Statistics:Fresher salary, Total No of employees, Indiaheadcount, Normal %age salary hikes or any bonuses
MY DATA IS TOO OBSOLETE 😉

Infosys

Ramakrishnan has the following opinion on the review on Infosys

Ramakrishnan said…
Just wanted to contradict certain points becuase this article is quite loud and also clear at some level. I am not sure who is the author of this review and definately not an authentic one. May be someone of the outsider who can write this!

1. MUST be on bench for six months – This is very specific statement and absolutely not practical for a giant like Infosys. At any time, the company maintains a fixed ratio on bench and with strict norms enforced, no more than X days can someone be blocked/benched beyond that time. Other options like transfer to other Business Units/DCs are thought of.

2. Quality of work – It depends in which Business Unit you are put into. The kind of work will always vary in any organisation through any level. But drawing the line on Quality in one statement is highly unfair. There are different kind of projects which are under operation and I wonder if the author ever got the chance to even hear about them.

3. Career Growth – Compared to competetitors in services industry, Infosys is definately best place for growth (FEW Exception cases ALWAYS exists)

4. Unplanned work – Infosys way ahead of its competitors in terms of processes and earned many awards for its process-oriented organization wide system of work

5. Onsite Oppurtunity – Show me any other IT Services where you can move out really fast in a month or two? Having said that, shiney people do take off onsite chances in 8-9 months!

6. Work – Life balance – This is how the industry operates and occasional working on weekend do exists in some projects which are highlighted CRITICAL. But I would say 90% people do not work on weekends. And on other weekdays if you can’t plan other work maybe because of the traffic situation prevailing in the city. People start from home at 6am to reach at 8:30am and again to start at 5pm to reach at 7:30pm

7. Satisfaction with SALARY – If you really need money then start your own business. What I feel is living your dreams is what pays you off.

8. Products – Infosys is NOT a product company but just to enlighten the author: Infosys has spun off few more products 1. OnMobile – through which 60-70% mobile phone value-added contents are provided to telecom operators2. Yantra.com – which is now aquired by AT&T Bell Labs Sterling Commerce.3.And Fincale

9. False publicity of ethics and values – I don’t which incident has left you with a bitter taste but overall on the comparison scale weighing other organization – Infosys ethics are far far far more transparent. You can question any higher level if something is bothering you. And work ethics you need to be here to understand that and then be somehere else to realise the difference.

Infosys

Introduction:

Infosys Technologies Limited is an information technology (IT) services company founded in Pune, India in 1981 by N. R. Narayana Murthy and six of his colleagues. It operates nine development centers in India and has over 30 offices worldwide. Annual revenues for fiscal year 2007 exceeded US$3.1 billion with a market capitalization of over US$30 billion. With over 72,000 employees worldwide, Infosys is one of India’s largest IT companies.

Training at Infosys:

The company gives 4 months of vigorous training in various technologies for non computer science students whereas for Computer science grades its around 2 months. The trainees will be exposed to various technologies during the training period. ILI (Infosys Leadership Institute) and E&R(Education and Research) departments plays a major role in shaping up the personalities of trainees at Infosys. ILI will hone up the client and people handling skills and E&R will enrich your technical skills.

How good is it for freshers?

Infosys is a good company for freshers to start their careers with. Infosys training transforms a fresher into a “domain-ready professional”. But the strategies they adopt for allocating resources to the projects across various business units are haphazard. The guy who is trained in Mainframes will be put into Java and so on. Resource Utilization is one of the greatest concerns that most of the employees have with Infosys. Its not an exaggeration that you must spend more than 6 months on bench.

Work at Infosys:

Infosys was a proven brand name. As a services industry this firm was always working on the cutting edge technologies. There would be no better place to get such a exposure to such a wide range of knowledge. I always feel that the top level management was transparent to extent it could be. But the Middle management is not very fair. Most of the times, you end up in doing what you don’t want to do. In case of time and material projects, which contribute to most of the Infosys revenue, change requests come on daily basis, which makes your tasks unplanned. Either it be a fixed price bid or time and material deal, the work Infosys does is just maintenance and enhancements.

Career growth and onsite opportunities?

Career growth may not be very fruitful in Infosys due to the flooding recruitment. At any point of time there are a bunch of people who can do a single task. This is hindering the opportunity for growth in the company. Onsite opportunity completely depends on the requirement in the project. You may get an onsite assignment in about 2-3 yrs if you join as a fresher.

Work pressure/Work – life balance.

In Infosys you have a very poor work pressure balance. Most of the employees stay late in the night. There will be no flexibility in the work schedule. Its almost impossible to plan any other thing on a working day. Often weekends are also devoted to work due to poor allocation of time and resources.

Satisfaction with salary and quality of work.

Its a known fact that Infosys pays a very low salary when compared to any other company in the Industry. As of now Infosys pays 2.7 lacs per annum to freshers. But the hikes and TPI (Trainee Performance Incentives) are low. Even the Business unit heads say Infosys never pays well. Quality of work is bad in Infosys. Most of the times the work is just maintenances and enhancements to the existing systems. SETLABS is a R&D unit in Infosys but not much of research output will come out of it.

What type of work they do:

Infosys primarily is a service oriented company. The only product Infosys has developed is Finacle which is a banking application. Although Finacle has gained a lot of market response, Infosys strategies are not drived towards Product development.

Job security:

Job security is one good aspect in Infosys. It almost equivalent to a job in Govenment
Organization. The cases where they fire you out is when you are caught under ASHI(Anti Sexual Harassment Initiative).

Some positives and negatives of the company:

Positives:
1. Training for freshers.
2. Cool campuses, amazing buildings, good facilities.
3. Job Security
4. Brand value of the company.

Negatives:
1. Poor pay structures.
2. Low Quality work.
3. False publicity of ethics and values.
4. One year of legal bond for freshers.

Do you recommend your company to others? Yes or No and Why?

Infosys provides good opportunities for people who have long-term commitment to the company. Again, luck will play a crucial role here. If you are interested in designing and developing something then you may need to think again before joining Infosys.

Infosys

Career growth and onsite opportunities? Depends heavily on Project, Project Manager and IBU. In general, HTMD is a very much-packed IBU. Margins for customers are less, so they expect more from their partners i.e. Infosys. Career growth would not be substantial as inition wise because all the projects are heavy weight mostly 100+ members. So, chances of standing out are rare and work is more or less routine. Onsite opportunity usually depends on project requirements. Usually after 3 years if not given one or possible in near future, then probably pack your bags

How is work environment and how efficient is the communication b/w teams or department? Communication between tracks within same project is pathetic; leave Inter Project or IBU or DC. In some cases intra-project communication is so poor that things are shot back to customer asking them to send it to right track or person, instead of internal reassignment.

Work pressure/Work – life balance. Infosys in general and HTMD in particular are particularly famous for poor balance. 12 hrs a day is normal. Moreover, as most people here are bachelors, so they don’t mind it as well. However, problem starts when someday you dont have work. People will be happy if u stay up to 9 and gossip around rather than going early.

Satisfaction with salary and quality of work. : Infosys is known to be a poor pay master. The average increment in salary or initial salaries are poor. However, people still remember success stories of people who became millionaires out Employee Stock Options Plan. Quality of work shouldn’t be called poor as this is what it is supposed to be. Don’t come here with lots of dreams of exploring rocket science. Here people mainly do mechanic job. You repair/maintain the existing software or add minor values to the software. But this is what it is supposed to be. If you are interested in doing something great either join R&D Division of any company or some product development company

What type of work they do: Product development, Services etc. Or if mix of these then what at percent? Mostly services. Finacle is the only product Infosys has developed until date. But this seems to have been the market leader since then.

Job security: Only time they throw people out is after the training when people fail to clear the test. Else, haven’t heard ppl being thrown out. If you plan some 30-40 year stint at a company, then this is the best place. You would retire as a senior management person for sure.

Some positives and negatives of the company. The strength and weakness of the company is the same its size. Big size has made it competitive, strong and a global brand. Also, Brand Narayan Moorthy has given it lots of publicity. However, same thing its size makes it a bureaucratic and slow. People take months to take a decision and Employee is the most neglected part. Company doesnt even thinks fit to inform its employees that there is a change in guard at top echelon and New CEO have taken charge. Not a company where you can have loyalty. However, when we say so, there have been instances in past (when under NRN Infosys arranged for helicopters to aero lift the relatives of Infoscions in Bhubaneshwar, when it was hit by a disastrous storm in 1999)

Do you recommend your company to others? Yes or No and Why? Depends on your interests and choices with you. Excellent Campuses with all the facilities. But pay is so low that through out your life you wont afford a house of your own. Ultimate Communist approach. Give employees all facilities but no money so that they can own some thing themselves. But definitely better than TCS and Wipro.

Infosys

Designer Buildings, Resort like campus, the inside of an Infosys campus is truly an international experience. Even the roads and grass are taken utmost care of, once me with a group of friends were walking on the campus lawn when some construction work was going on, a small cluster of grass was careful dug and kept aside so that it can be replaced after the maintenance work is over. My friend quipped if they cared for employees the way they care for grass, it would be the biggest gift one could have from Infy. In a big company like Infy you are nothing more than a number and its common to be treated like a computer. Like a Desktop you can be on desk (bench intended) for months or be working for 24 hours at a stretch.
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Fresher Salary:2.7 lakhs per annum. Infy is not a good paymaster; in fact it has earned a bad name because of low salaries, a friend of a mine when leaving the company was told by a project manager that “Yeh company to khoon choos leti hain”.
Career Growth/Onsite Assignments:Yes, good opportunities exist, if you are lucky you will get an onsite assignment within 2 years, though with the increasing number of employees nothing is sure, the decision to send a person onsite is random and does not necessarily depend on a person’s performance (I have even heard about regionalism playing an important role).

Training: Infosys gives mandatory training to fresh engineers which is a major plus point if you want to learn about computer science technology. The training period is 2 months for computer science guys(i.e only generic training), for stream specific training another 2 months are there, but it is about a year long for those going to Finacle Projects. Its a different matter very little of that is going to be actually used for example ‘Open Systems’ is one stream which has very little relevance in the kind of projects Infosys has. Infy has mostly migration, maintenance and testing kind of projects ( see link for more). Mainframe is old technology but still in use, so cant comment on how useful it is. Enterprise Solutions has training on various modules from different vendors (SAP, Oracle). It gives more of functional knowledge. This is really important thing to appreciate in a services company like Infy more than technical skills, it is functional knowledge that matters. And that is why i write the training is not really that useful. I would appreciate it more if they give free internet access to employees so that they can google out solutions to technical problems.
Work Environment: Work environment depends a lot on individual projects and project managers. Speaking of inter department communication, I will give you an example once I had to get a software installed on my computer by CCD (Computer Maintenance Department), the way the department people responded to me was very much similar to what you can expect from a government office in Bihar. Even communication between IBUs(Independent Business Units) and DC (Development Centers) is in a sorry state of affair. I was transferred from Bhubaneswar DC to Pune DC but after reaching Pune DC I was told, “We didn’t know you were coming, We don’t want you!!”.
Brand Value/Respect:One of the most renowned brands in India, especially because of performance in stock market. If you meet a person who does not belong to IT industry he would think you are working for the top most IT company.
Work Life Balance: Again depends a lot on the project you are in, but given the initiative which was started by NRN when I was in Infy “On Time Initiative ”, wherein the time when an employee was coming and leaving was noted and the average time was calculated for the whole organization, I would say the top management does believe in maintaining a balance. HR also plays a active role in celebrating employee week and other events, but again at times project deadlines dont allow employees to be a part of all the fun.

Job Security: If Job Security is the question, Infosys would get 200 out of 100, this was probably the only company which didn’t shed employees during the 2000 US economy slowdown. Unless you are doing something unethical you don’t stand a chance of being thrown out, and off course if your performance is not very poor.
Founders of company: Founders Narayan Murthy and Nandan Nilekani are among the most well-known business leaders of the company. Other founders if not that popular are still playing in crores. I believe its because of the founders that Infosys has a transparent nature when it comes to appraisals and salary hikes, but i doubt how much the middle management values these ethics.
Co-workers competence: I wouldn’t rate Infy high on this some employees are rather poor and what they have is working knowledge of English and Zero technical skills.

Bond:Infosys signs fresh engineers for a year long bond.

Facilities: Facilities are excellent, there are facilties for gym, sports and other activities but these resources are strained because they are inadequate in proportion to the number of employees, but one thing which deserves mention is Infosys toilets which are better than most 5-star hotels can boast off.

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