US President Trump is a potential threat to business, declares India's IT giant Wipro

A month after IT giant Wipro reportedly fired hundreds of employees as part of its annual 'performance appraisal', the country's third largest software services company has now declared US President Donald Trump a potential threat to business.

According to an Economic Times report, the IT firm said this in its annual filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

“Significant developments stemming from the recent US presidential election could have a material adverse effect on our business,” Wipro said in its filing.

The development comes at a time when Indian IT companies are facing an uncertain environment given the curbs being proposed on worker visa norms by various countries like the US, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand.

Last month, Trump had signed an executive order that calls for a review of the H-1B visa programme, saying they should never be used to replace American workers and must be given to the most skilled and highest paid applicants.

With visa programmes becoming more rigorous, Indian IT companies are likely to face challenges in movement of labour as well as a spike in operational costs.

Indian IT companies get over 60 per cent of their revenues from the North American market, about 20 per cent from Europe and the remaining from other economies.

Besides, higher adoption of technologies like automation and artificial intelligence is also reducing the need to have a large number of employees at client sites.

Wipro Technologies (Wipro Ltd)