HLL announces partnership with Capgemini for Indigo

Hindustan Lever Limited (HLL) has announced that it has reached agreement with Cap Gemini S.A. for Cap Gemini S.A., the parent Company of the Capgemini Group to take a 51% stake in Unilever India Shared Services Ltd ("Indigo") . Indigo is currently a fully-owned subsidiary of the Company, providing BPO services to a number of Unilever Companies, including the Company, around the world. Terms of the agreement were not disclosed and the transaction is expected to be completed in October 2006.

The partnership with Capgemini will bring world-leading financial BPO practices to the Company and to Unilever. Indigo´s domain knowledge and deep capabilities built in the FMCG sector coupled with Capgeminis BPO expertise will enable Indigo to leverage its strengths and offer services to customers outside the Unilever Group. The partnership arrangement will ensure smooth implementation of the Company´s transition into SAP as the ERP platform, as well as in other ongoing projects.

The partnership with Unilever will strongly supplement Capgemini´s market - leading business process outsourcing capabilities in finance and accounting in India and support Capgemini´s strategy to enhance the existing BPO global delivery network in Poland, China, India, Australia, USA and Canada. It will also bring to Capgemini tremendous capabilities around innovative services like compliance and control assurance. Capgemini already has about 6000 professionals performing work in India (in Bangalore, Kolkata and Mumbai) and aims to reach the strategic objective of 10,000 employees in India by the end of 2007.

Indigo is a provider of financial shared services and Sarbanes Oxley compliance services to the Unilever Group throughout the world. It has operating centres in Bangalore and Chennai and has nearly 600 professionals, including about 75 Chartered Accountants, working in these centres. It currently serves Unilever Companies in about 45 countries in Asia, Africa, Australasia, Europe and North America. Indigo has rich experience of migrating and operating a variety of accounting and financial services across a number of countries and has considerable domain expertise in servicing the Fast Moving Consumer Goods industry.

Mr. D Sundaram, Finance Director of the Company and Chairman of Indigo said, "the partnership with Capgemini brings global shared services skills and technology to HLL and Unilever. It also enables leveraging the current Indigo expertise and capabilities and represents an exciting opportunity for Indigo employees to extend the business outside of the Unilever Group".

Source : Equity Bulls

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