Several posts on Facebook claim that Infosys, an IT firm founded by the Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s wife’s father, is registered in Rwanda. They also claim the UK outsources “many of its immigration processes” to the firm. The implication is that this is connected to the government’s recent announcement about relocating some migrants who travel to the UK illegally to Rwanda.
Infosys is a multinational IT and consulting firm that was founded in India but has staff across Asia, Europe, the US and Africa and the Middle East.
The claim seems to have stemmed from an entry on the OpenCorporates website, which publishes data on companies registered around the world. The page in question lists “Infosys Services Ltd” as having an incorporation date of 30 April 2014, in the jurisdiction of Rwanda and names a region of the city’s capital as its registered address.
But a spokesperson for Infosys, which was founded by Akshata Murty’s father, N.R Narayana Murthy, told Full Fact: “We are not registered in Rwanda, nor have we ever had any employees in Rwanda.”
It’s not clear what the ‘Infosys Services Ltd’ registered in Rwanda is (or was), and it doesn’t appear to have a website. The company founded by Ms Murty’s father is also listed on Open Corporates under the name “Infosys Limited” and has separate pages for all its branches, including those in Hong Kong, the UK, Ireland, the US and New Zealand, but none in Rwanda.
The Infosys website doesn’t list an office in Rwanda. That’s not to say Infosys has never been involved there. A 2014 press release on the site reports that the company helped Equity Bank roll out new software across five countries in Africa including Rwanda.
Infosys has been awarded government contracts
Anyone can search which companies have been awarded government contracts on gov.uk’s Contracts Finder. When we searched for Infosys, 23 awarded contracts came up, none of which appeared to be for “immigration processes” as the Facebook post claims, or anything related to immigration.
Two contracts had been awarded to Infosys by Transport for London and its financial arm. Several contracts were with the University of Nottingham for software, as well as the Care Quality Commission for a new CRM and several local councils for other services.
But we could find no evidence that the company has been awarded contracts to help with immigration processes.
Infosys is mentioned on the UK government’s website on the subject of immigration, in a press release about a new visa application centre in India. It says: “It is anticipated that the opening of the new [visa application centre] will serve to benefit some of the biggest IT firms in India, including Infosys”.
Image courtesy of the Treasury via Flickr.