new delhi it services provider hcl technologies will increase the salaries of their employees by 010 per cent from october 1 which will result in a drop in its gross margin by 130 basis points we have decided to increase the wages of the employees effective from october 1 2009 by 010 per cent and this will result in our gross margin dropping by 130 basis points for the next two quarters hcl tech ce0 vineet nayar told reporters here after announcing the first quarter results at the end of september 30 hcl techs total employee strength stood at 54443 the company added 665 professionals in the it services segment during the period further the company is looking at acquisitions aggressively to fill in the gap in its service areas and offerings acquisition is a part of our growth strategy you will see acquisitions hopefully in bpo enterprise application space engineering and cloud computing side nayar said we have successfully managed five acquisitions in the last 34 quarters our margins are back to its original level of 19 per cent he said adding there is no fixed price tag for the acquisition for the quarter ended september 30 hcl technologies today reported 1850 per cent growth in its net profit at rs 30075 crore shares of hcl tech were trading at rs 31780 down 056 per cent in afternoon trade on the bse