Zensar Technologies Ltd

NSE:ZENSARTECH

Earnings Call Analysis

Zensar's Optimistic Start to FY '25

Zensar Technologies reported $154.4 million in revenue for Q1 FY '25, a 4.2% sequential increase. Healthcare and banking sectors grew by approximately 7%, with gross margin standing at 30.4%. EBITDA remained in the mid-teens at 15.2%, while PAT was 12.3%. The company faced minor margin declines due to operational cost increases, offset by exchange benefits. Meanwhile, cash reserves climbed to $280.9 million. Zensar acquired BridgeView Life Sciences to boost its healthcare sector. The company is optimistic about continued growth across all verticals supported by strategic investments and employee satisfaction, evidenced by a low attrition rate of 10.6%.

Steady Revenue Growth Amid Challenges

In the first quarter of financial year 2025 (Q1 FY '25), Zensar Technologies reported a revenue of $154.4 million, reflecting a sequential growth of 4.2% in reported currency and 4.3% in constant currency. This marks the second consecutive quarter of sequential growth across all verticals, indicating a steady demand for their services despite a backdrop of industry-wide uncertainties.

Margin Dynamics and Financial Health

The company recorded a gross margin of 30.4%, down by 20 basis points from the previous quarter. The decline was largely attributed to rising operational costs, specifically travel and user licenses, impacting margins by 150 basis points. However, there was a positive impact from improved utilization and a one-time R&D tax credit, which together added 110 basis points back to margins. EBITDA stood at 15.2%, but a normalization considering one-time effects elevates it to an effective 16.3%.

Operational Efficiency and Workforce Management

Zensar improved its employee utilization rate by 20 basis points sequentially to 84%. The company also reported a reduction in voluntary attrition to 10.6% from 10.9% in the previous quarter, and a total headcount increase of 855 employees, indicating a robust approach to workforce management and operational efficiency despite industry-standard challenges.

Strategic Acquisitions Fueling Growth

An important strategic move was the acquisition of BridgeView Life Sciences, aimed at enhancing Zensar’s capability in the healthcare and pharmaceutical sectors. This acquisition is expected to bolster their offerings and competitiveness in a high-potential growth area, signaling Zensar's commitment to strategic investments.

Sector Performance Insight

Healthcare revenues grew by 6.9%, while banking and financial services increased by 6.8%. Other sectors, including manufacturing and TMT (Telecom, Media, and Technology), also displayed modest growth, albeit with TMT expected to witness some furlough impacts moving into the second quarter, providing a degree of caution.

Guidance and Future Outlook

Facing a volatile macroeconomic environment, management remains cautiously optimistic about sustaining growth. Although some headwinds from furloughs are anticipated, particularly in the TMT sector, they are targeting to maintain growth rates of around 4% quarter-on-quarter as per guidance, depending on the synergy of their ongoing projects and market conditions.

Mitigating Wage Hikes and Cost Pressures

Zensar anticipates a $3 million impact from salary hikes, translating to a potential margin impact of 180 to 200 basis points. Management is engaged in mitigating this pressure through operational optimizations and strategic planning to ensure overall profitability remains stable.

Emphasis on Innovation and Capability Enhancement

Continued investments in AI and cloud technologies are part of Zensar's strategy to efficiently meet client needs and enhance service delivery. The management has highlighted extensive efforts in employee training and cross-training programs to leverage existing talent better, thus ensuring readiness to face competitive pressures.

Robust Financial Position

Zensar ended the quarter with cash and cash equivalents of $280.9 million, reflecting an increase of $19.2 million. With an improved Days Sales Outstanding (DSO) of 72 days, the company underscores its strong cash flow management and financial agility, providing a buffer to navigate through potential market fluctuations.

Earnings Call Transcript 2025-Q1

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to the Zensar Technologies Limited Q1 FY '25 Earnings Conference Call hosted by HDFC Securities. [Operator Instructions] Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Amit Chandra from HDFC Securities. Thank you, and over to you, sir.

[Amit Chandra, analyst]

Thank you, Michelle. Good morning, everyone. On behalf of HDFC Securities, I welcome you all to the Zensar Technologies' Quarter 1 FY '25 earnings call. We have with us Mr. Manish Tandon, CEO and Managing Director and few other members of the senior management team. Before I hand over the call to Manish, I would like to highlight that the safe harbor statement of this second slide of the earnings presentation is assumed to be read and understood.

Thank you, and over to you, Manish.

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Thank you, Amit. Hello, good morning, good afternoon, good evening, everyone. It's -- first of all, thank you for joining the call today on our budget announcement day. I appreciate your energy and interest in Zensar. With me on this call are a few of my colleagues, Vijayasimha, Chief Operating Officer; Vivek Ranjan, Chief HR Officer; and Nimesh Khemka, Global Financial Controller.

Client centricity has been a core tenet for us at Zensar. Our highest-ever customer service score in FY '24 shows that we have made significant progress in establishing ourselves as strategic partners of choice amongst our clients. We have started FY '25 with green shoots across key parameters and have witnessed good momentum across our portfolio. Our employee happiness score has been at an all-time high of 84% for the last 2 consecutive years. Average annual variable payout was 100% in -- for FY '24. Effective July 1, we have announced the annual salary hike of all our employees as per schedule, unlike some of our industry peers. LTM attrition further improved to 10.6% from a very low of 10.9% last quarter.

With our [ EEE ] proposition and our domain-led approach, we have enabled our clients to achieve their transformation goals. We continuously enhance our service offerings to meet the evolving needs of our clients with tailored solutions. As a part of our strategic investments, we are pleased to announce that Zensar will acquire BridgeView Life Sciences, a Pennsylvania-based technology and consulting solutions company in life science industry, specializing in pharmaceutical commercial segment. This move reinforces our focus on the health care and life sciences vertical and bolsters our end-to-end pharmaceutical commercial quality and regulatory capability.

For Q1 FY '25, our revenue stood at $154.4 million, which is a sequential quarter-on-quarter growth of 4.2% in reported currency and 4.3% in constant currency. For the second consecutive quarter, we have registered sequential Q-o-Q growth across all our verticals. In constant currency terms, on a Q-o-Q basis, our revenue in healthcare grew by 6.9% Banking and financial services had a growth of 6.8%. Manufacturing and consumer services grew by 2.7%, and even TMT, Telecom, Media and Technology, grew by 1.2%.

With that, I will now invite Nimesh, our Global Finance Controller, to provide an update on the critical financial data. Nimesh?

[Nimesh Khemka, executive]

Thank you, Manish. Good day, everyone, and thank you for joining this call. In addition to Manish talking about the business, I'll be taking you through some of the key financial metrics for the quarter ending June '24.

The revenue -- the reported revenue for the first quarter of financial year '25 is $154.4 million in U.S. dollar terms, reflecting a growth of 4.2% sequentially. In constant currency terms, the revenue grew by 4.3% sequentially. The gross margin for the quarter stood at 30.4%, a drop of 20 basis points, quarter-on-quarter basis. The decline was primarily due to increase in operational costs, including travel user licenses impacting margins by 150 basis points, which was offset by the exchange benefit of 20 basis points, increase in utilization and volume positively impacted the margin by 40 basis points and onetime benefit of 70 basis points on account of the R&D credit achieved during the quarter.

SG&A has increased by 110 basis points on a quarter-on-quarter basis, primarily on account of a provision created for doubtful debts for one of our customers who had filed bankruptcy under Chapter 11. We exited Q1 FY '25 EBITDA at 15.2%, which is in line with our given range of mid-teens. Our PAT stood at 12.3%. Order book for the quarter stood at 154 million.

Cash and cash equivalents increased further by $19.2 million to $280.9 million, and DSOs improved by 1 day to 72 days on account of healthy collection contributing to overall financial health and operational agility of the company.

With that, I now invite Vijayasimha, Chief Operating Officer, to comment further on Q1 FY '25 results.

[Vijayasimha, executive]

Thank you, Manish and Nimesh. Greetings, everyone. I will share details about our operational efficacy, service line performance and capability enrichment initiatives. We are continuing our journey on operational excellence and making good progress. Our utilization improved by 20 basis points sequentially and 140 basis points year-on-year. The rigor associated with accelerated fulfillment and capability enrichment continued in Q1. We had a gross addition of 855 employees in the quarter. Our overall head count increased by 47 compared to Q4 of FY '24. As described by Manish, our voluntary attrition reduced to 10.6%.

Service lines, the offering from our service lines and industry services groups continue to resonate well with our clients. The share of revenue from our service lines, that is advanced engineering services, data engineering and analytics, experience services, cloud and infrastructure services increased to 53.2% in Q1 of FY '25, which is 100 basis points higher sequentially. On a quarter-on-quarter basis, in reported terms, data engineering and analytics grew by 17.9%. Advanced engineering services grew by 9.3%. Cloud infrastructure and security, which was previously called as foundation services, grew by 4%. Application services and enterprise applications grew by 2%. Experience services revenue dipped by 3.1% coming off a stellar previous quarter growth of 9.1%.

On the capability enrichment front, we are continuing to build upon the strong outcomes in FY '24. Our talent transformation effort is focused on accelerating the shift towards T and Pi shaped skills through gamified learning events developed by our service line academies. We deepened our focus on health care, BFSI and MCS domains by expanding multilevel domain training and certifications.

Partnerships with key technology providers have been instrumental in delivering cutting-edge certifications and collaborative learning experiences in AI, GenAI, data engineering and cloud. Our continued innovations in AI/GenAI have enabled us to deliver significant benefit to our clients. We are helping clients build a robust cognitive infrastructure and collaborating with them to effectively leverage our innovative AI solutions like engineering body, data body, business [ out-cast ], responsible AI framework, et cetera, to deploy secure, scalable and sustainable solutions for their micro-vertical level business challenges.

With that, I hand it back to Manish.

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Thanks, Vijay and Nimesh. The macroeconomic situation, along with geopolitical threats and cybersecurity challenges continues to make the environment volatile. We expect the markets to remain unchanged in FY '25. Our strategic focus and investments in key areas have helped us drive resilience across our business. While concentrating on growth trajectory, we are constantly working on -- to develop the skills and resources necessary to support our clients in reaching their objectives.

With that, we can open the line for questions.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] First question is from the line of Nitin Padmanabhan from Investec.

[Nitin Padmanabhan, analyst]

Congrats on a strong quarter. Manish, I had a few questions on -- you did mention that the environment remains unchanged and can be volatile. The current quarter, the deal wins have been relatively flattish year-on-year and the book-to-bill is 1. And I think as an outsider, basically, what we have seen is there's a reasonable correlation between the wins and the revenue attrition in the following quarters.

So just wanted your thoughts there in terms of is there a reasonable backlog that could help in the near term? And two, how is the pipeline looking? And does that sort of give confidence? And also from a large deal from the pipeline -- in the pipeline, how does that look? So that would be the first question.

[Manish Tandon, executive]

All right. So Nitin, first of all, we are very happy with the order bookings that we have had this quarter. If you compare it to the same quarter -- this is a seasonal number. And if you compare it to the same quarter last year, it is almost flat, which is a good sign because, I think, last Q2, we delivered some decent results. So hopefully, we'll be able to do something equivalent this time also based on order book.

But again, from a pipeline perspective, the pipeline is okay. There is a lag in order booking because, last quarter, we did $180 million or so in order books. So some of that is already there. With that said, Q2, I think we have not seen the full impact of this cybersecurity outage. In the past, when this has happened, some of the dollars allocated towards project suddenly get diverted towards more cybersecurity. That is one.

And the second thing is that we are seeing some furloughs in the tech sector, which are happening in this quarter, which is the first time that it has happened in the last few years that I know of. So there are -- there is momentum definitely, but there are also headwinds. So we are cautiously optimistic about the Q2 based on our order bookings, based on our pipeline and based on what we are seeing in the market. I know you have not asked about the margin, but I'm sure that the next question is going to be on the margin.

So I just want to make clear that the 15.2% EBITDA margin has an one-timer of 1.1%. And hence, the effective normalized margin should be 16.3% EBITDA margin. This is because of Chapter 11 reorganization filed by one of our clients. And in line with prudent accounting, we have taken the entire receivables of that client and put them -- provided for them, although there is a reasonably good chance of some recovery. So effectively, the normalized margin of this quarter is also 16.3% instead of the reported 15.2%.

[Nitin Padmanabhan, analyst]

Great. Just a follow-up on the margin, right, so when you look at it going forward, I think this quarter, we also had some reasonable on-site shift. And do you think that sort of files in the second half of the year? Do you think there are some [ offshore ] shift in the second half?

Second is, from a wage increase perspective, what do you think would be the broad kind of impact? And finally, on the travel and visa and licenses, which is the 150 bps impact, how much of that is sort of nonrecurring? If you could just isolate that portion out, will be helpful.

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Vijay, you want to answer?

[Vijayasimha, executive]

Yes. I think the wage increase, as Manish said, we have given, I think, industry-level wage increase. That is likely to have a $3 million impact on a quarterly basis going forward. But we are taking, perhaps, in terms of operational efficacies like pyramid optimization and so on and so forth to, like, help minimize the impact of the wage increase.

With regards to your question of -- the second one was around visa, travel as well as licenses. Licenses is going to be recurring, whereas visa and travel are one-timers that we saw in Q1. And I think the third point was around on-site ratio. On-site ratio, while the on-site mix, in terms of revenue, increased by 1.4%, the effort mix only increased by about 0.4%. We think that it will be in that range. It's a small range. Depending on the type of projects, there'll always be a 0.5% here and there that will happen. So those are the 3 factors that did impact the operating margins in Q1.

[Nitin Padmanabhan, analyst]

Sure. The visa and travel, what would be the one-timer, if you could just quantify?

[Vijayasimha, executive]

I mean, we have some travel for whatever, projects starting and stuff like that. So those things was why it increased a little bit.

[Nitin Padmanabhan, analyst]

Yes. I'm just trying to figure out the tailwind from that in the following quarter. That's all.

[Vijayasimha, executive]

No, I think it's too small to, like, talk about a tailwind from that.

[Operator]

The next question is from the line of Nikhil Choudhary from Nuvama.

[Nikhil Choudhary, analyst]

My first question is regarding the furloughs. Manish, what you highlighted, it's relatively usual to see furloughs in this quarter. So can you highlight any particular vertical or geo you are seeing this kind of furloughs and...

[Manish Tandon, executive]

These furloughs usually happens in TMT as a vertical, which is telecom, media and technology. So that is where -- that is the vertical where it is happening.

[Nikhil Choudhary, analyst]

And any quantification, Manish, if possible?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

No, we wouldn't like to comment on the quantification.

[Nikhil Choudhary, analyst]

Got it. Moving on to the Chapter 11, which one of the clients had filed, how much will be the impact on receivables, the write-off?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Receivable was -- the write-off was $1.7 million, 1.75 million, right?

[Vivek Ranjan, executive]

Yes, yes.

[Manish Tandon, executive]

$1.75 million, which translates to about 1.1% in margin dilution because of that. So that's our effect. The normalized EBITDA margin should be around 16.3%.

[Nikhil Choudhary, analyst]

And just one follow-up, Manish. Generally, when this kind of event happened, companies continue to serve the client for some period till they reach some agreement. So is it fair to assume even in next quarter, you will have impact from this client?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

No. As per Chapter 11 norms, whatever you do after the bankruptcy is filed, those receivables are covered by the bankruptcy financing laws. And we are also one of the -- we have also positioned ourselves as one of the key creditors or strategically important critical vendors, so we have a better chance of receiving. To answer your question, whatever we do after bankruptcy… [Technical Difficulty]

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, the we have lost the management's line. Kindly, stay connected while we try to reconnect.

Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for patiently holding. The line for the management any has been reconnected. Over to you, sir.

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Thank you. I hope it was not another Crowdstrike incident. But we were discussing bankruptcy. And see, first of all, this was a small client and this is a small client, about $300,000 per month of billing or so. And what I was trying to tell you is that the receivables that we have post-bankruptcy filing, the work that we do post-bankruptcy filing, as per the bankruptcy laws of the U.S., they have to be paid. And there is bankruptcy financing arranged for that by the client, and we will get paid for that. Anything that was before that, which is that $1.75 million or so that we are talking about, has been already provided for in the books. So there is no further risk associated with this as far as shareholders are concerned.

[Operator]

The next question is from the line of Manik Taneja from Axis Capital.

[Manik Taneja, analyst]

Manish, just wanted to understand this comment around furloughs in the high-tech vertical. If you could elaborate in terms of what's driving this. I presume this is largely true within the top customer. And how should we be thinking about our earlier thought process about seeing sequential revenue growth every single quarter through FY '25 in the backdrop of some of these challenges? And the second question was with regards to margins while you alluded to the onetime impact in the current quarter. How should we be thinking about -- some of our operating levers…

[Manish Tandon, executive]

So first...

[Manik Taneja, analyst]

Sorry, there are some background noise. So I was just requesting to understand about your margin outlook for the year.

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Yes, margin outlook for the year remains unchanged as before. We have said the EBITDA -- mid-teen EBITDA margins. We will -- we are still there in that range, and we will continue to maintain -- we continue to maintain that outlook, number one.

Number 2 was your point about furloughs. I do not comment on individual clients. So there are furloughs in the TMT sector. You are free to gauge whatever you want to gauge from it, number two.

Number 3 was growth quarter-on-quarter irrespective of this, I mean, that's what I get paid for, I guess, maybe not enough. But we are committed to making sure that we deliver. Irrespective of the environment, we continue to deliver growth quarter-on-quarter to our investors. And until now, since we have been there as this new management team, we have delivered growth every quarter, except for Q3 of last year.

[Operator]

The next question is from the line of Chirag Shah from White Pine Investment Managers.

[Chirag Shah, analyst]

Just one small follow-up on this after-revenue provision that you made in your P&O. One, you said that the revenue account was $300,000 annual, right?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Per month.

[Chirag Shah, analyst]

Per month. Okay. Sir, my question is can you talk a bit about what is the size or a broader indication of what kind of customer that [ loves ], one. And what is the tail risk that we have if the U.S. cycle turns for -- not -- turns around on the negative side. What is the tail risk we have for the smaller accounts that we have? If you can just speak about these, it would be helpful.

[Manish Tandon, executive]

So first of all, we don't want to comment on the sector or the client. It'll be inappropriate for us, number one. Number two is you talked about tail risk. As you see, our DSO is the best that it has been in the last 10 years, okay? And our provisioning policies remain very robust. So there is no -- I mean, look, 1 or 2 clients might go under sometimes as a part of creative destruction of capitalism. You will continue to see growth -- clients growing, clients falling off the way. And as your management team, it's our responsibility to manage it.

We are trying to manage it. We will manage it in a relatively efficient and risk-free fashion for our shareholders. And as I said, the best way of looking at it is in terms of DSOs, and our DSO is best in class or best for us in the last 10 years. So our quality of revenue is solid.

[Chirag Shah, analyst]

Okay. So just to clarify on this thing. We are seeing that we don't have many smaller accounts, which could be vulnerable. That is the way to understand. There could be one of ways I understand -- I'm not even denying that it's an important part of business, but there is no major tail risk as such, where every quarter or once a quarter for -- we may have -- once a year, we may have to make this kind of provisions or bigger provisions. That is the way to understand, correct?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

I have been here for 6 quarters now. This is the first time that we are making provision and that also 1.1% of revenues.

[Chirag Shah, analyst]

Yes, sir. The quantum is very small, I agree. I'm not even debating that. I'm just trying to understand our customer profiling because, most of the time, we focus on top 10, top 15, maybe top 20, 30 customers. We don't talk about the tail, which could be aggregate level, 8%, 10% of revenue, 15% of revenue.

[Manish Tandon, executive]

The tail risk, from my perspective, see, there are tail accounts. The first question to ask as a service provider are the tail accounts because of us or because of the client. So there are lots of logos in the tail accounts, which we have not been able to farm effectively. And the focus there is to farm them.

There are tail accounts where we don't see too much potential, so we restrict our commitments to those accounts in order to maintain our basic servicing. So you have to look at it at a portfolio level. From a financial perspective, as I said, we have very, very conservative provisioning policies. And I don't see much risk in terms of...

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] The next question is from Sandeep Shah from Equirus Securities.

[Sandeep Shah, analyst]

Manish, in the last analyst meet, you said you are aspiring to add a large deal across just the vertical segment where we operate. So any update on that? And what are the prospects of improving traction on the large deals in FY 2025?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Only 1 quarter -- Sandeep, only 1 quarter is over in the FY '25. So we are still gunning for it. There are a few in the pipeline. And hopefully, we should be convert -- be able to convert 1 or 2 of them.

[Sandeep Shah, analyst]

Yes. So what I meant is do you believe the pipeline creation and the growth on the large deals is increasing because of the efforts and the focus?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Yes, of course. I mean, as -- like any good operating team, you have to keep looking at the data and looking at -- to see if there are -- if whatever you're doing is making sense and having an impact. And we definitely see the impact -- the positive impact on our pipeline as far as large deals are concerned.

[Sandeep Shah, analyst]

Okay. And sir, based on the revenue run rate of the bankrupt account, it looks like it's 0.6% to the top line. And there would be also furlough in the TMT in the Q2. So is it fair to assume this, too, could be a headwind on the growth in the 2Q on a Q-on-Q basis, despite that, you are saying we are cautiously optimistic? So do you believe a 4% growth scenario can be maintained? Or there would be headwind and those momentum may not be maintained because of these headwinds?

[Nimesh Khemka, executive]

Sandeep, I could wish I could answer -- I wish I could answer your question. I have asked the Board that we should be able to give guidance in quarters that with analyst calls will be shorter but there's still -- the Board is deliberating on it. But yes, I mean, it's my job to tell you that -- what the headwinds are and what the tailwinds are. And that's what we are trying to do there, and you can make your own assessment.

[Sandeep Shah, analyst]

Okay. But this bankruptcy account could have a tailwind on the growth in the Q2, right?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Bankruptcy, whatever was a tailwind of ours is already gone. Whatever are the -- we already had renegotiated the contract. So this is -- this -- this was only baked into our numbers. And as I said, whatever we are going to bill post-bankruptcy filing, which was July 7, I think, from July 8, that is, anyway, going to come to -- will get paid on priority. So there is no headwind per se. Whatever is the headwind was in terms of a circle and that we have provided for already.

[Sandeep Shah, analyst]

Okay. Okay. And Manish, with furloughs being there in the Q2, is it fair to assume this time, 3Q could be slightly better? Or there will also be a seasonal softness in 3Q because of furloughs continuing in 3Q over the year?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

So the fundamental nature of the industry has not changed, Sandeep. Q3 has been though for the industry for very long, and I don't see that changing in a hurry.

[Sandeep Shah, analyst]

Okay. And last question, in terms of second quarter, we have called out $3 million worth of wage hike impact. That would be roughly 180, 200 bps to the margin. Is it fair to assume most of it could be compensated? Or we believe flattish margin is the best case scenario? Or a base case scenario?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

That's a $3 million question. We are working every day to mitigate the impact of the wage hikes. We are taking lots of actions. And there's a whole bunch of actions like [ permit ] optimization, the on-site observation, all sorts of things are there. And we are working on making sure that, that is mitigated to the extent possible.

[Operator]

The next question is from Amit Chandra from HDFC Securities.

[Amit Chandra, analyst]

So my question is on the BFSI vertical, obviously, we have seen a strong recovery there. So if you can throw some more color what is happening there. Are you seeing some increase in the distribution spend there? Or is it more structural? Or is it more due to some shorter-term projects there?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

So Amit, BFSI vertical, for us, has been relatively strong throughout, and our underperformance has been primarily due to the TMT vertical. So over the -- if you look at -- over the last few quarters, every time, in BFSI, there has been a positive momentum. And this quarter, it is showing up very well, but that momentum has continued to build for us, and this sector has done well for us. Regarding your question on is it onetime projects or is it going to continue, well, I hope it is going to continue because even where we are doing projects, we have larger projects, which we don't see ending quickly.

[Amit Chandra, analyst]

Okay. And sir, we have been investing in the health care and life sciences vertical, so we have also seen a strong recovery there in terms of growth. So if you can throw some more color on the acquisitions that we have done in terms of the visualized health care, which is in the health care consulting space. So what kind of synergies will we see there? And what are the earnout targets there?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

So Amit, financially, whatever we had to communicate on the acquisition, we have communicated in the filings. But the strategic rationale, I can spend a little bit of time to explain that. See, first of all, as you know, we started the health care licenses vertical in Q2 or Q3 of last year 2024, so one way for -- to look at small tuck-in acquisitions in the right area, so we actually created a go-to-market strategy.

We figured out that this is the space that we want to go after, which offers quick returns, and it's more strategic. And so we zero-ed in on BridgeView Life Sciences. And in the charter, it might have been lost, but this is basically we are going after pharma commercial area, and this is Zeva related.

And as you know, those who follow this industry, that Zeva has decided to move away from sales force, and we expect a lot of work to be happening on these movements, both in sales force and in Zeva. So that is the strategic rationale for doing this acquisition. We are getting some very good talent with it. We just had our first town hall with the BridgeView Life Sciences team. They are very excited about joining us, and we are also very excited about having them as a part of our team.

[Amit Chandra, analyst]

Okay. And now if you can comment on the Africa as a geography, because it has been weak for 4, 5 quarters now. So how do you see that geography? Is it still strategic to us? Or we are trying to...

[Manish Tandon, executive]

South Africa is a strategic geography for us and it has not been -- see, the problem there, it has not been weak for us. In fact, actually, the volume growth in that geography has been very good and constant currency growth has been good. It is just that the brand has declined by 10% or so from $16 to $1 to I think $18-point-something to $1, and that gets reflected -- that does not show up in the numbers.

But South Africa is doing very well for us from an organic growth perspective. We have the who's who of that country as our client, and this is one country that Zensar actually has a larger presence than most of its Indian larger peers also. So it's a very strategic industry for us, and we will continue to invest in it, and we will continue to invest for growth.

[Amit Chandra, analyst]

Okay, sir. And on the furloughs that you mentioned, obviously, we are seeing for the very first time. But in this quarter, we had the full quarter impact of furlough? Or we'll see the full quarter impact in the next quarter, specifically furloughs?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Furlough is about -- mostly it varies from 1 week to 2 weeks based on listing and it happened in July. So you have not seen the furlough impact in this quarter.

[Amit Chandra, analyst]

Okay. And in terms of the hiring plans, how do you see that in -- like we are running at 84% kind of utilization and what are the hiring plans? How many freshers do you want to hire in this [ year ]?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

This is the first time that the actual net head count has increased.

[Vivek Ranjan, executive]

Second quarter in a row.

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Second quarter in a row that the net head count has increased. So we are being -- first of all, I mean, when you see utilization of 84%, we have to give credit to the CEO and the delivery teams and this thing, that they are -- it's not just about hiring. It is about cross training so that we can utilize the people that we have already. It is one of the most people-friendly policies that we have as a company. We invest a lot in training, cross-training of our people so that we can redeploy those people first rather than trying to hire new people from the market.

And wherever possible, we are looking at onboarding [ freshers ]. I think we onboarded about 50 last quarter, and we will onboard maybe 100 or so in this quarter also.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] The next question is from Nitin Padmanabhan from Investec.

[Nitin Padmanabhan, analyst]

Manish, from the other verticals, which is, I think, TMT, manufacturing, consumer, how has the cross-sell sort of initiatives sort of helped so far? And how is that done? So that's one part. And I think the very fact that you are even thinking of our guidance means and this not -- that has improved structurally, which was in the case earlier. So thanks for that. But just some thoughts on these 2 verticals on the cross-sell and the pipeline and all of that would be helpful.

[Manish Tandon, executive]

So in MCS, most of the -- in fact, growth, as you remember what Vijay said, growth has been coming primarily from cross-sell only. And that is reflected that in our TAM, in our service lines. Between Q4 and Q1, we have a 100 basis point increase in revenues on service line, right? What used to be 52%, 53% is now, whatever, 53%, 54%. And that itself is an indication that the cross-selling mechanism is working well.

The other mechanism that we also track is account planning and to see how we are using our service lines to penetrate accounts, and I'm happy to report that those are also doing that.

[Nitin Padmanabhan, analyst]

Sure. Perfect. And just one last question. On BridgeView, any thoughts on how margins are versus the rest of the company?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

It'll not to be margin dilutive or EPS dilutive this year is all I can say.

[Operator]

The next question is from the line of Sandeep Shah from Equirus Securities.

[Sandeep Shah, analyst]

Yes, sir. Just a question, Manish. I think, earlier, you indicated that this year, we aspire to be in line with the industry growth. And next year, we can be in the leaders' quadrant in terms of the growth rates. So looking at the current macro environment, do you believe we are on track for this? Or anything else you would like to highlight, which will take us in that growth path?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Sandeep, you are best positioned to answer that question. Yes, all the quarterly results are coming this year, this quarter. Almost everyone is through. And you know our quarterly number, the quarterly number of the industry. So you are in the best position to think and comment on it. We are committed to making things happen, which are in line with what we have promised to the market.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] The next question is from the line of Chirag Kachhadiya from Ashika Institutional Equities.

[Chirag Kachhadiya, analyst]

[indiscernible]

[Operator]

Sir, I'm sorry to interrupt. Your audio is too low, sir.

[Chirag Kachhadiya, analyst]

Yes. Now it's audible?

[Operator]

Yes, sir. Yes, sir.

[Chirag Kachhadiya, analyst]

So Manish, I have 2 questions with respect to telecom and BFS vertical. So how do we see, for the next 3 remaining quarters of the fiscal? And what sort of de-rated discussion going on for these 2 verticals?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

We are very positive about all our verticals. So as I said, we are seeing -- this is the second quarter in a row where all our verticals have shown sequential growth. And we are hoping that we will continue to maintain that momentum going forward.

[Chirag Kachhadiya, analyst]

Any peaking order, like, which verticals do that, like, who do well in incoming quarters and you have more expectations from [ them on ]?

[Manish Tandon, executive]

All these verticals are like my kids. So happy with success of each one of them. There's no favorite amongst them.

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, that was the last question for today. I would now hand the conference over to Mr. Manish Tandon, Chief Executive Director and Managing Director for closing comments. Over to you, sir.

[Manish Tandon, executive]

Thank you. And first of all, as I said before, today is budget day. This is a very small event in -- compared to what big event is going to happen today. So appreciate your interest in attending this call with us. As the management team, we remain committed to making things work for our shareholders and look forward to talking to you again next quarter.

Thank you very much.

[Operator]

Thank you, members of the management. On behalf of HDFC Securities, that concludes this conference. We thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines. Thank you.