J P Morgan Chase & Co, a leading financial services firm with assets of over $800 billion, is likely to extend its exposure to Wipro for developing an enterprise-wide operational risk management system. 
 
This project was bagged by the financial solution division of Wipro in April 2003. Valued at $2.5 million, this deal was supposed to be executed over 18-24 months. 
 
Wipro is likely to benefit from J P Morgan's recent announcement to acquire Bank One Corporation, the sixth-largest bank holding company in the United States, with assets of $320 billion. 
 
J P Morgan and Bank One Corporation are expected to complete the merger of their holding companies in mid-2004, subject to regulatory approvals. 
 
According to Girish S Paranjpe, president-finance solutions, Wipro Technologies, "The deal with J P Morgan is likely to be extended following the financial services firm's announcement to acquire Bank One. However, we are not able to clearly ascertain the period of extension or the total value of the deal as of now." 
 
J P Morgan has associated itself with Wipro for nearly seven years and is one of its key clients. Wipro's financial solutions division faced stiff competition from the likes of IBM and Accenture before bagging this contract in April 2003. 
 
Following this win, J P Morgan was keen on pursuing the business analytics part, while Wipro had to only implement the execution part. 
 
However, within 2-3 months of bagging this project, Wipro's understanding of this space resulted in sending a team to actually articulate this project. 
 
Having successfully completed 14 months in executing this deal, Wipro is not only confident of meeting any excess requirements from J P Morgan, but is also ready to take on the bigger players who offer solutions for operational risk management. 
 
"In the operational risk management space, this is indeed one of the top 10 projects executed across the industry. Following this win, we are certainly on the radar to be considered for large deals in the future," Paranjpe added. 
 
The key feature of Wipro's solution for operational risk management is the fact it complies with the Basel II norms. 
 
Scheduled to be implemented in 2006, the Basel II norms will not eliminate the 8 per cent minimum ratio of capital to assets, but will give banks more flexibility in weighing those risk by providing several new options for calculating credit and operational risks. It is estimated that world over, banks will spend nearly $ 12 billion by 2006 to comply with the Basel II norms. 
 
The finance solutions arm of Wipro is also upbeat about the result of executing a project of this nature to J P Morgan. 
 
"Besides evoking interest among many risk management firms, several of Wipro's customers have also inquired about the manner in which this deal is being executed," Paranjpe added. 
 
Wipro's finance solutions division registered over 50 per cent growth in its topline to touch $ 140 million (excluding BPO), for the full year ended March 31 2004. It has been awarded the Financial Times / The Banker magazine's "Risk Management Award" for its work for J P Morgan Chase & Co. 
 
J P Morgan Chase & Co operates in over 50 countries. The firm is a leader in investment banking, financial services for consumers and businesses, financial transaction processing, investment management, private banking and private equity.  

A component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average, JPMorgan Chase is headquartered in New York and serves over 30 million consumers nationwide and many of the world's most prominent corporate, institutional and government clients.