WNS (Holdings) Limited (NYSE:WNS) Q1 2024 Earnings Call Transcript

Keshav Murugesh: Yes, great question, Bryan. First thing I’ll tell you is clients are extremely comfortable that they have a partner like WNS, who has invested so solidly, first of all in terms of domain, in terms of technology transformation, as well as [indiscernible] over the years that have led the way in terms of their own transformed models over the period, so I think there’s comfort that we are operating as an extension of their enterprises and therefore we can lead them in unknown areas around generative AI proactively. It’s a big, big comforting factor. That’s the first thing I must tell you. In many of my conversations with clients, I’m also realizing that a number of them are wondering why there’s so much hype on this particular area, right, and the reason for that is because they say, you guys have led us through all of the other disruptions that we’ve seen across the years, we are super confident that you will lead us through this one as well, and it is not that any of them want to dramatically change their models overnight because of the generative AI outlook out there in the marketplace.

I think what they’re looking for only is comfort that our partner understands the space, can integrate it quickly as the space evolves, and can help us in terms of possible markets, higher productivity, all the other good things. From that point of view, we are very comfortable. We spoke about a large initiative that we’re driving in our in-house and some of the areas that we’re focused on that will start impacting our internal–our existing clients at this point in time. But we are also excited about the fact that a lot of this is now going to help us penetrate that 75% unpenetrated BPM space, right, and therefore we’ll have to watch this space, because we’re excited. We will keep making announcements around things that we are doing here, but it will be in a very measured manner and it will be all around not only helping every one of our clients with the opportunity around generative AI, but also getting into new areas that we think are now getting opened up as a result of our investments in this space.

Sanjay Puria: And maybe I’d just add to that, that specifically there will be certain [indiscernible] of the investments, specifically gen-AI as well as the AI area of what Keshav just spoke about. This is a time not to, like, shy away but be making those investments from [indiscernible] perspective, and accordingly maybe we’ll start seeing in quarter two a margin a little bit lighter than quarter one compared specifically, along with some of the return-to-office and some of the short term revenue with high margins, what we saw in quarter one.

David Mackey: Yes, and just to add to that, Bryan, just to give folks some color about what we’re seeing in terms of activity levels and inbound questions from our customers, we are currently in discussions with more than 20 of our clients about specific gen-AI use cases, and at this point in time we have secured commitments from three of those clients to implement those use cases. We are seeing people come to us, as Keshav mentioned, to help them with this journey, to understand what it means for them, and I think we’re in a great position to be able to lead them through this journey.

Bryan Bergin: Okay, thank you very much.

Operator: Please stand by for the next question. The next question comes from Ashwin Shirvaikar with Citi. Your line is open.

Ashwin Shirvaikar: Thank you, good day gents, and congratulations on the quarter. I wanted to ask about the new organization structure implemented at the beginning of April. Are you beginning to see the benefits that you expected or is it too early, I mean in terms of just looking at growth profile, looking at demand, looking at responsiveness? What metrics are you using, and any kind of early update that you can provide would be great.