Bank of America’s $1bn contract ups the stakes among IT vendors

 With business of about a billion dollars up for grabs, there's expected to be intense competition between Indian and global IT vendors for Bank of America (BoFA)'s core IT outsourcing contract. 

The Bank has floated a request for proposal (RFP) which could trigger fresh price wars as incumbents Infosys, TCS and Accenture gear for a slugfest with other Indian and global peers eyeing a slice of the pie. The trio will definitely have to contend with Wipro as the Azim Premji-promoted company has become an empanelled IT vendor for BofA's RFP Astrological Prediction For Indian Stock Markets

Bank of America has called for a rebid of core IT services like application development and maintenance (ADM), testing and infrastructure management services (IMS). The Charlotte, North Carolina based-bank with a market cap of $179 billion is the second-largest bank holding company in the US by assets. Its 2008 acquisition of Merrill Lynch made it the world's largest wealth management corporation and a major player in the investment banking market. When TOI reached out to Mark Pipitone, SVP-corporate communications of BoFA, he said, "Unfortunately, we do not comment on our vendor relationships Share Market Astrology

BoFA counts Infosys and TCS as major Indian IT vendors with annual contact values of $250 million and $250-$275 million respectively while Accenture gets $300 million business from the US bank annually, said sources familiar with the company's vendor mix. Its other IT vendors include HP (EDS), Aon Hewitt and Polaris. "It's natural during such rebids there is some shift in allocations and non-incumbents to win new market share. In such a scenario, one can expect intense price wars in the market to retain or win new business," said IT industry expert Siddharth Pai Indian stock market astrology prediction

Phil Fersht, CEO of US-based IT advisory firm HFS Research, feels that it is highly likely that the rebid could get extremely competitive. "The wallet share moves from MNCs to Indian-heritage vendors is still happening, but not as aggressively as it used to be with the likes of Accenture and IBM defending their turf better, and more experienced clients valuing other elements beyond merely cost." 

Many large deals coming up for renewal have a sizeable infrastructure component to them and most of these involve very large, complex legacy systems that need to be modernized. London-based IT research firm Ovum estimates that contracts worth $13 billion will be up for renewal this fiscal year. This includes Detroit-based General Motors that had awarded a $2-billion IT outsourcing contact in 2011 for ADM, SI and IMS that will come up for renewal in July this year Financial Astrology 

Peter Bendor-Samuel, CEO of US-based Everest Group, feels BoFA's move to rebid ADM, testing and infrastructure is significant not only for the potential share shifts it could drive within the BOFA portfolio but also indicates the changing landscape in which long established relationships are increasingly at risk, and at the expense of other industry players. "The implications of this is an increasingly completive environment where price and margins are coming under pressure," he said Himanshu Tiwari Astrologer