French consulting and IT services provider Capgemini on Tuesday posted an 18.4% increase in third quarter revenues at constant exchange rates, helped by strong bookings and growth in its digital and cloud offerings.
Capgemini, which offers services to industries ranging from telecoms to aerospace, reported slightly better-than-expected quarterly revenue of 4.01 billion euros ($4.74 billion).
Digital and Cloud services grew more than 10%, accounting for over 60% of its business during the quarter.
In a call with journalists, Chief Executive Aiman Ezzat said that the pandemic and shift towards remote-working highlighted the importance of businesses quickly moving their activities online.
"People who weren't in the Cloud suffered, and so we've seen an acceleration of projects linked to that," he said.
Ezzat said the company, whose clients range from German drugs firm Bayer to Daimler's Mercedes-Benz and the UK Ministry of Defence, was also planning to launch new services in life sciences R&D, 5G and self-driving, where it helps companies test their autonomous systems.
In France, the company's biggest single-country market, Capgemini saw a good improvement on the previous quarter but continued to see the strongest impact from COVID-19.
As a second wave of COVID-19 infections surges through Europe, France has reported the highest number of cases on the continent and fifth highest worldwide.
Capgemini said it expected the end of the year to show a further quarter-on-quarter improvement, though less pronounced than in the current period.
The group confirmed its full-year targets, which include revenue growth between 12.5% and 14.0%, adding it should exceed the mid-point of this range.
(Reuters)
