Wipro on Friday met Street expectations when it reported a 7.8 per cent decline in net profits for the quarter ended March 31.

CEO Srinivas Pallia cautioned that there could be more short-term challenges as the economic environment remained uncertain.

The country’s fourth-largest IT services firm clocked a net profit of Rs 2,834.6 crore compared with Rs 3,074.5 crore in the year-ago period. Analysts had expected the company to report a net profit of around Rs 2,800 crore.

Revenues during the period came in at Rs 22,208.3 crore compared with Rs 23,190.3 crore in the corresponding period of the previous year. Analysts tracked by Bloomberg had pencilled in a topline of Rs 22,226.70 crore.

During the quarter, revenues from IT services were at $2,657.4 million, an increase of 0.1 per cent on a sequential basis and a decrease of 6.4 per cent over the previous year period.

Wipro expects revenue from this segment to be in the range of $2,617-2,670 million for the quarter ending June 30. This translates to a sequential guidance of (-)1.5 per cent to + 0.5 per cent in constant currency terms.

Speaking to the media, Pallia admitted that 2023-24 was a challenging year for the industry while pointing out that “the macroeconomic environment remains uncertain”.

“Last year posed big challenges for the whole industry, it has affected Wipro’s performance too. The economic environment is still uncertain, and there might be more challenges in the short term. However, the opportunities before us are limitless,” he said.

“We are on the brink of a major technological shift. Artificial intelligence is transforming our clients’ needs as they seek to harness its power for competitive advantage and enhanced business value. At Wipro, we have been gearing up for this moment,” he added while disclosing that Wipro has already been training its employees to tap into the AI opportunity.

On being asked about his priorities, Pallia said that while Wipro had simplified its operating model, it now had the “building block firmly in place” and that he was “committed to expanding this even more”.

He pointed out that while there was still a considerable amount of work ahead for the company, the immediate priority was accelerating growth.