The first quarter results are out. Despite gloomy recessionary environment, many of our IT bellwethers remained profitable in the first quarter of this fiscal. While Infosys, Wipro, Cognizant, and TCS saw an average net profit of around 12 to 19 percent, Mahindra Satyam (formerly, Satyam Computers) recorded a 45 percent net profit.

The IT software services exporter Infosys witnessed a 17.2 percent year-on-year net profit rise in the first quarter of 2009 (Q1 FY09). The net profit rose to Rs.1,527 crore ($314 million) in April-June, the fiscal first quarter, compared to Rs.1,302 crore ($272 million) a year ago. However, on a sequential quarter-on-quarter basis, the company has posted a 5.3 percent drop in net profit while the topline was down by three percent. In terms of revenue, Infosys saw a decline of 2.9 percent to Rs.54.72 billion (Rs.5,472 crore) in the first quarter, from Rs.56.35 billion (Rs.5,635 crore) in the fourth quarter last fiscal.

India’s third largest IT giant, Wipro, remained profitable in the first quarter this fiscal despite marginal revenue decline in its global IT services business sequentially and annually. Net profit for the company grew 12 percent year-on-year to Rs.10.16 billion (Rs.1,016 crore), while consolidated revenue increased five percent to Rs.62.74 billion (Rs.6,274 crore) as per the Indian accounting standard.

TCS (Tata Consultancy Services) reported a growth of 19 percent in consolidated net profit for the first quarter of current fiscal at Rs.1,533.94 crore. The company’s net profit rose 18.85 percent from Rs.1, 290.61 crore for the same period last year. The total income increased over 12 percent to Rs.7, 206.99 crore as against Rs.6,410.70 crore in the corresponding period last year.

Cognizant Technology Solutions reported a net profit of ($113.1 million) for the first quarter of this fiscal, up 11 percent from the year-ago quarter. Its revenue rose to ($745.9 million), up 16 percent from Q1 FY08.