By Mark Ballard for The
Register.
This story has been reproduced with permission.
Paul van den Berg, a business development manager at Wipro
Limited in the UK between July 2003 and February 2005, is suing
Wipro Ltd, the firm's UK arm, for breach of contract to get what he
says is unpaid commission of at least £1m on a deal estimated to be
worth in excess of $200m.
His solicitor, Hanna Weber of Zimmers Law, said his commission
could be worth upwards of £3m since the value of the contract might
now be worth as much as $500m.
His claim against Wipro Ltd, filed with the High Court in
London, stated that the exact amount of commission owed couldn't be
known until full details of the deal were released.
The claim states that Wipro had lured van den Berg from his job
at rival outsourcer Infosys, where he had been doing business with
Royal Dutch Shell Plc since 1984.
Wipro offered "significantly more lucrative payment terms in
particular in relation to commission" because it valued van den
Berg's relationship with Shell, it said.
Van den Berg's claim is also made against Mr Kees ten Nijenhuis,
who as a vice president of Wipro Europe had offered the salesman a
1.25 per cent commission, it said. The terms were agreed in part
verbally with Nijenhuis and top Wipro executive Sudip Nandy, but
did not all find their way onto paper.
Van den Berg persistently complained that his commission had
failed to materialise. The claim said he complained to Wipro
chairman Azim Premji about it.
Wipro's defence, filed at the High Court on its behalf by
Timothy Pitt-Payne of PWC Legal, denies that it lured van den Berg
from Infosys with the offer of a lucrative commission.
It said van den Berg approached Nijenhuis for a job with the
suggestion that he could help Wipro win the Shell account. It said
that during interviews, Nijenhuis had explained that Wipro's
salespeople got incentive payments on top of their salaries, but
that human resources would settle the details.
Documents submitted by the defence say that during van den
Berg's interviews, Wipro had noted that he worked at Infosys and
had good contacts at Shell.
Wipro says it offered van den Berg an index-linked €100,000
salary, a €40,000 sales incentive made "in accordance with the
[Wipro's] Sales Incentive Scheme", and medical and car allowances.
It denied Wipro offered a 1.25 per cent commission.
"There was no agreement whatsoever between the parties in
respect of renumeration (whether by salary, bonus, or otherwise)
save as set out in the contract dated 21 June 2003," said the
defence.
Van den Berg's contract of employment with Wipro, also submitted
by the defence, confirmed the basic salary and €40,000 bonus.
The Sales Incentive Scheme applied to all employees reporting to
Nijenhuis, said the defence. It consisted of a sales target and a
"Z factor", which was a function applied to the commission that
"reflected the difficulty of the financial target applicable to
that employee.
Wipro said that van den Berg's terms were set only in his
contract and were not also made, as claimed, orally, by email and
implied by conduct. It denies some meetings and telephone
conversations in which van den Berg claimed his terms were agreed
ever took place.
The firm also denied that Azim Premji, its chairman, heard van
den Berg's complaint about non-payment of his commission on a visit
to Bangalore.
"The claimant would have had no opportunity to speak to someone
as senior as Mr Azim Premji on a matter of this nature," it
said.
Wipro admitted that van den Berg had "executed" the Shell
business, but said he had not "procured" it.
It said in its defence that hundreds of people had been involved
in the bid for Shell and he had worked on only one of five
"streams" of the initial bid. Then, over five days, van den Berg
worked on the due diligence as one in a team of five people, which
was one of five such teams, all of which were supported by a
300-strong staff.
It noted that van den Berg was one of seven people involved in
the final negotiations, but claimed his role was not pivotal. The
defence said Wipro had paid van den Berg all he was due.
A preliminary hearing is set for 14 May, said Weber.
© The Register
2007
