Bengaluru, Aug. 16 -- Mid-sized information technology (IT) services companies like Mphasis and Hexaware Technologies are investing in advisory firms that help large corporations set up back-end technology hubs or global capability centres (GCCs) in India, in their bid to win substantial tech and engineering contracts later. This strategy, analysts say, enables IT services firms to get faster access to new clients and an easier entry into the country's $68 billion global capability centre market, which is expected to swell to $105 billion by 2030. Picking up a stake in these consulting firms makes business sense for the homegrown IT outsourcers, as they can start providing tech services, and secure support and maintenance deals as soon as the big foreign firms set up their GCCs in India, the analysts said. On 10 July, Mphasis invested $4 million in Aokah, a US-based GCC advisory firm, for a 26% stake. During the company's post-earnings interaction with analysts on 25 July, MD and CEO Nitin Rakesh said the acquisition was done "with a view that we will essentially have an opportunity.in helping shape deals as clients start thinking about GCCs and the various shapes and forms that it takes." Similarly, Hexaware acquired SMC Squared on 17 July for $120 million. Its management attributed the move to the "robust revenue opportunity" that SMC brought. Currently what SMC does is to have (GCCs) set up. But what it does not do is transform operations, especially with the AI opportunity. "That's a capability that Hexaware will bring, and we think it will deepen the relationship with the customers for whom we set up GCCs," said Ramakarthikeyan Srikrishna, Hexaware CEO, during the company's post-earnings call on 25 July. Mphasis and Hexaware ended April-June with $437 million and $382 million revenue, up 1.6% and 2.8% from the preceding quarter. The investments come when GCCs present a complex web of challenges and opportunities. One chief executive of an IT firm attributed higher attrition to clients hiring away talent for their own in-house tech hubs....