Edelman to handle global PR mandate for Infosys

 22nd March 2018    PR News 
 Paarul Chand

IT major Infosys has hired Edelman to handle its' global PR mandate.

Rakesh Thukral, managing director, Edelman India, told PRmoment India that he was "Delighted to confirm that we have got the global mandate for Infosys. It's an honour to have them as an Edelman client."

The firm will handle the work in several markets inlcuding the crucial US market as well as India, UK, Germany, France and ANZ.

Sources told PRmoment India that Edelman won from a pool of four finalists that included a team from WPP agencies and Golin.

While internationally, Edelman will replace Lewis PR. In India interestingly, Edelman takes over from Adfactors PR after the latter won the Tata mandate, which included it's most profitable firm TCS. TCS was handled by Edelman earlier as part of the Tata mandate.

With Adfactors PR winning the account of Infosys rival TCS, and several other Tata Group companies in January this year, Infosys and Adfactors PR parted ways in February due to the conflict of interest between Infosys and TCS.  Infosys then sent out the RFP inviting pitches. Adfactors PR was the firm's agency during the open spat between Vishal SIkka, former CEO and MD and founder N.R. Narayana Murthy. This, finally led to Sikka's exit from Infosys and was eventually replaced by Salil Parekh.

Before Adfactors, The PRactice had handled the account for over a decade. Among the PR challenges that will face the incoming PR firm is an uncertain US market, Infosys's largest market, with an increasing protectionist President Trump.