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Information technology services and tech support solutions firm CSS Corp. launched its third delivery center in Bonifacio Global City (BGC), which is expected to increase its annual revenue by $10 million. In a statement on Tuesday, CSS Corp. said the new office in Asia Century Center (ACC) will employ 500 new talents that will further drive the company’s workforce growth. “The recent growth that the company has experienced is only a testament that there are more opportunities for us in the region and it strengthened our plans to expand in the country in the coming years,” said Arvind Appavu, country head of CSS Corp. Philippines. The new office will provide services to various industries such as high-tech verticals, internet service providers, original equipment manufacturers, and telecommunications companies based in America, Europe, the Middle East, Africa and Australia. The company also provided the new office space a 50-seater training facility, an outdoor area for relaxation, an arcade game room, and a meditation room. “The amenities we have included in our state-of-the-art office facility will not only ensure the productivity of our employees but will also provide them an environment where they can constantly hone their skills, boost their careers and maintain their mental, physical and emotional well-being,” Appavu said.

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Video Interview by Sundar Sampath, EVP and Global CFO, CSS Corp

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We spoke with several CFOs and found out the following jargons to be commonly used by many of them…We all know what EBITDA stands for, but do we know what EBITDAC means? Let’s find out.

We have brought the top three words and meanings that CFOs taught us in 2020:

1: EBITDAC: Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, Amortization, Covid
(Sundar Sampath, Executive Vice President & Global CFO, CSS Corp)

2: Circle of influence and concern: Helps us focus on what one can do instead of what one can’t do

(Sandeep Bhatia, Group CFO, Lendingkart Technologies)

3: VAS – Value Accretion for Stakeholders

(Gopal Balachandran, CFO & Chief Risk Officer, ICCI Lombard)

4: Insight – Smart data provides intelligent insights. For data to be smart, it must evolve through its various stages; Descriptive stage, Diagnostic stage, Predictive stage and Prescriptive stage.

(Sameer Kamath, ED & Group CFO, Avendus Capital)

5: Time value of money (in financial services business): One rupee in hand today may be better than 10 in an unknown future period

(Sandeep Bhatia, Group CFO, Lendingkart Technologies)

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CSS Corp, a new-age IT services and technology support company today announced that it has been named as a gold winner in the ‘Most Resilient Company of the Year 2020′ category in the 10th Annual Best in Biz Awards.

Right at the onset of the pandemic, CSS Corp’s proprietary and award-winning resilience framework enabled the seamless roll-out of a 100 per cent productive Work-From-Home (WFH) model across its 18 global delivery locations. Being among the early movers in the industry to follow a WFH model from March, the company embraced the new normal with resilience, agility, and determination, thus rendering utmost support and efficient service with zero-disruption to its clients.

The three-phased resilience framework of prepare, stabilize, and thrive created a cohesive and structured blueprint for the organization which enforced guidelines, ensured employees with adequate support and resources, as well as assured clients with timely support, communication, and engagement. CSS Corp was among the few companies in the industry to roll out annual compensation hikes, as scheduled in April 2020.

The company also implemented their five-pronged strategy called the CHEER framework, which stands for- Communication with Employees, Highlighting Accomplishments, Energizing teams, Engagement with Employees, Recognition of achievements for employee well-being. It spreads positivity and recognizes employees for their consistent efforts during these unprecedented times.

“When the world was facing an unforeseen pandemic, we made sure to create a consistent and vibrant culture across the organization that encourages and comforts our employees and provides seamless and constant communication. We are proud to be recipients of this award as it reflects how CSS Corp ensured zero impact to its clients and employees through tremendous resilience. A lot of credit is due to our 8,000 plus employees across the globe who showed immense passion and unstinting commitment during this phase to keep our flag flying high,” said Manish Tandon, Chief Executive Officer, CSS Corp, commenting on the recognition.

“Corporate resiliency has never been more important than in 2020 and the winning entries in the 10th annual Best in Biz Awards have impressive accomplishments in this area,” said Mark Huffman, Consumer Affairs, having judged six of the last 10 Best in Biz Awards competitions.

2020 marked the 10th annual Best in Biz Awards and – with a continuing global pandemic – was also a year like no other in the program’s 10-year history. Despite the global challenges, the 10th annual program saw a particularly strong field of entries from public and private companies of all sizes and spanning all geographic regions and the judges were impressed with the year’s winners’ agility and adaptability that allowed their businesses to thrive, their willingness to always go the extra mile to help their customers in these unusual times.

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The last decade saw an unprecedented adoption of digital transformation initiatives. Technologies such as cloud, mobility, analytics, automation, AI (artificial intelligence) and the likes enabled enterprises to reimagine everything from customer experience to business growth. These technologies came, they reigned and they transformed. Every facet of enterprise strategy bears the sweeping impact of these technologies and their transformative touch. Digital innovation is reaching new heights and ushering in digital maturity and adoption at scale.

Technology is taking huge strides in the areas of hardware, software/services and human experiences. These developments are inter-related and their intersection compounds their impact on transformation. Here are the top trends set to make a mark in 2020:

Quantum computing, 5G and autonomous things top the list of advancements in hardware

• Quantum computing: With the competition for quantum supremacy becoming intense, 2020 should see advances in quantum computing where it begins contributing to the real life by powering complex AI  applications.

AI and quantum computing will emerge as two sides of the same coin. For instance, a quantum computer could help enterprises that process voluminous transactions at super speed to develop virtual assistants that have high contextual awareness and almost human-like sensitivity towards customers.

• 5G: Although 5G has gained significant momentum, and some operators have begun offering high-speed services in dense urban locations in some countries, challenges persist. When it comes to the scale of deployment, operators can deploy 5G at a larger scale, but with low band. A combination of 5G+4G (non-standalone deployment) facilitates optimal coverage without compromising on the data demands of customers. Moreover, most devices in the market are ill-prepared to support 5G yet. In 2020 and the years ahead, manufacturing companies will catch up to build devices that support 5G.
• Autonomous things: AI, ML (machine learning) and deep learning are equipping robots, drones and autonomous vehicles to act and control their environment. Gartner stated that the leaders of enterprise architecture and technology innovation are gearing up to take advantage of the opportunities presented by autonomous things. Amazon’s package delivery through drones and automated warehouses are prime examples. The year 2020 will see the introduction of many more autonomous devices to empower humans.

In the software/services area, expect hyper-automation, digital workforce and AI-based security to mature

• Hyper-automation: Hyper-automation goes beyond desktop automation to integrate systems and automate core business processes to amplify the organisation as a whole. It involves everyone in the organisation to be part of the transformation journey. With RPA (robotic process automation) at the core, hyper-automation will leverage people, processes and tools such as AI, analytics and deep-process mining to scale up automation capabilities and unlock unforeseen efficiencies.
• Digital workforce: With the power of RPA, AI and ML, digital workers have incredible potential to augment the human workforce.

Digital workers can analyse like humans, and execute with the speed and accuracy of robots. A digital worker can automate the entire process without any supervision. As digital workers become mainstream in 2020, it will usher in a new future of work.

• AI-based cybersecurity: With the growing number of interconnected systems, the threat of cybersecurity looms large. AI-based attacks have increased significantly and enterprises are turning towards highly-sophisticated AI cybersecurity (offensive AI) to counter the advanced attacks in the modern threat environment.

A focus on amplifying experiences for both customers and employees will drive conversational commerce, ambient experience and citizen access

• Conversational commerce: This offers a convenient and smart way for customers and businesses to interact. Conversational commerce is possible through AI-powered chatbots coupled with cognitive intelligence to deliver an augmented and personalised customer experience. Enterprises can shorten the time it takes to satisfy customer needs, right from the first greeting to the final payment, and redefine customer experiences through conversational commerce.
• Ambient experience: Enterprises are swiftly moving towards offering ambient experiences across omnichannel. The rise of AR (augmented reality), VR (virtual reality) and MR (mixed reality), along with a cohesive integration of knowledgebase and CRMs have made ambient experiences a high possibility — especially in environments with high customer interactions. AR, VR and MR have emerged as compelling options to provide premium customer experience by harnessing the power of AI to merge the virtual and real-world seamlessly in real time.
• Citizen access: Building reusable applications through low-code or no-code platforms, or drag-and-drop interfaces is the new norm.  The industry will witness rapid democratisation of technology, which will allow people to access technical expertise easily and create technical solutions without any extensive training on the necessary skills, eg: citizen data scientists and citizen programmers. Organisations would rely on AI-driven development and automated testing so that all employees can contribute to it.

Technological advancements across hardware, software/services and experiences, and their controlled collision are pushing the envelope of innovation with every passing year. These technologies are high in value, maturity, or both, and together they are redefining the way organisations operate and create value in the ecosystem.

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Unquestionably 2020 has been an unprecedented year and industry leaders hope that the upcoming budget will address the challenges faced by businesses and propel the economy towards faster recovery and growth.

IT experts opine digital technology and connectivity continue to be the cornerstone of India’s growth and leadership. Since the pandemic accelerated the shift to digital, they say there is a need to maintain this growth momentum, as it will have a cascading effect on creating efficient businesses, new jobs and all-round development.

Lower interest rate regime

According to CP Gurnani, MD & CEO, Tech Mahindra, R&D spending must be increased to accelerate digital transformation and jumpstart education with a focus on next-gen technologies, skilling, reskilling and upskilling programmes to nurture young talent pool, subsequently accelerating a journey towards an ‘Atmanirbhar Bharat’ (Self-reliant India).

“We also hope to see focused initiatives to boost consumer sentiment, accelerate infrastructure development, move towards a lower interest rate regime and increase investments in key areas including healthcare and education,” he said.

ALSO READ | What IT industry expects from Budget 2021: Higher Innovation Quotient, push for infra building, and more

From an IT perspective, Gurnani expects the government to create a fund for product companies along with extended SEZ (Special Economic Zone) benefits in the new normal of remote working, besides nurturing an ecosystem for deep tech startups in areas including blockchain, artificial intelligence, augmented reality and virtual reality.

“India is on the path of a higher growth trajectory and the vision of a $5 trillion economy can be achieved with a focus on economic growth and development,” added Gurnani.

Sundararajan Sampath, EVP & Chief Financial Officer at CSS Corp, suggests that the upcoming tax regime must ensure that there should be 100 per cent clarity on the continued availability of SEZ tax benefits to all existing and new SEZ units even if they continue to operate on a WFH basis.

Furthermore, he said, “We hope all expenses to ensure WFH would be allowed as business expenditure. There should be no ambiguity on the allowability of such expenses.”

He further said, “With the recent Karnataka High Court verdict in M/S Biocon Ltd Vs Commissioner of IT, we hope the Employee Stock Option cost (Fair Market Value less strike price amortized over the vesting period of stock options) will be allowed as business expenditure.”

“We also urge the centre to bring back the 80G deduction for CSR expenditure for companies opting for the new tax regime,” added Sampath.

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