Mumbai: Infosys Ltd, India's second-largest computer services company, started a service with WPP plc to help clients track marketing information on sites including Facebook and Twitter.
The pay-per-use service will be hosted on the cloud, the company said in a statement. It contains "listening tools" that help users gather, organise and analyse consumer responses to online campaigns, according to a product brochure.
Infosys is moving into products as revenue growth in computer services slows and profit margins narrow, and after competitors outside India built similar platforms. Larger rival Accenture Plc's Accenture Interactive also offers services to help customers benefit, as online advertising is forecast to surge to more than $102 billion (Dh374.6 billion) in 2013 from an estimated $88 billion this year, according to ZenithOptimedia.
"They're moving into products and platforms because it's definitely got higher margins, for one," said Ankita Somani, an analyst at Angel Broking Ltd. in Mumbai who rates Infosys buy. "You develop products, you develop IP, and you sell it."
Infosys aims for products, platforms and solutions to contribute one-third of its total revenue, compared with 5.8 per cent in the year ended March 31, most of which came from the Bengaluru-based company's banking products.
Worldwide spending on IT services will increase at a slower pace of 1.3 per cent to $856 billion this year, after climbing 6.5 per cent in 2011, Stamford, Connecticut-based research company Gartner said April 5.
The new Infosys platform, called BrandEdge, has customers including GlaxoSmithKline and has been released in a test version, said Sanjay Purohit, of Infosys.
