India’s top IT services companies are gaining ground by grabbing large and mega deals in specific sectors like banking, financial services and insurance (BFSI), reported Financial Express (FE).

IT firms across the globe have taken steps to optimise costs in the current uncertain economic environment, said the report.

Last week, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), country’s largest IT services firm, announced an over £600-million (about $723-million) contract with Phoenix Group, UK’s largest long-term savings and retirements provider, to digitally transform the latter’s ReAssure business using the TCS BaNCS-based platform. The deal is an expansion of TCS’s long-standing partnership with the Phoenix Group, reported FE.

The report underlined that deals of more than $100 million are considered large deals among IT companies. Deals of more than $500 million in value are considered mega deals. For TCS, such mega deals are coming back to the firm after four years.

In 2018, TCS signed a contract worth more than $2 billion in revenues with Transamerica, a leading provider of life insurance, retirement and investment solutions with an aim to transform the administration of its US insurance and annuity business line. The very same year, TCS expanded a deal with UK-based insurer M&G Prudential taking the deal value to over $1.2 billion in 10 years, the report added.

“There will be some large deal initiatives as the current macroeconomic situation develops and clients want to optimise costs as well as provider consolidation strategies mature, similar to the pandemic where we saw a one-time increase in large deals. This is likely to be triggered by account or industry-specific issues and not a change in deal trends for the long term…We see BFSI firms often taking significant measures in a recession or financial downturn to optimise costs,” Nitish Mittal, partner, Europe Technology Practice, Everest Group was quoted as saying in the report.

Infosys signed 32 large deals whose total contract value stands at $3.3 billion in Q3, the numbers are at their highest in the last eight quarters, said the report.

Talking about the future growth of the company, Salil Parekh, CEO and MD, Infosys, said “We see good traction of large deals, and we have seen more and more relevance, connect with our clients on the cost efficiency and automation plays,” the report elaborated.

Wipro has also signed 11 large deals recently with a total contract value beyond $1 million during Q3. “Our pipeline of large deals is both strong, and diversified…Our large deals include new and existing clients seeking a transformation partner, or going through vendor consolidation,” Thierry Delaporte, CEO and MD, Wipro said in the post earnings call, reported FE.