Bengaluru, July 14 -- HCL Technologies Ltd on Monday unveiled plans to build data centres, reversing a stance it took nine months ago against investing in asset-heavy businesses as the country's third-largest information technology (IT) services company seeks a bigger role in the artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure value chain.

The announcement accompanied a muted set of April-June earnings, where it reported 0.9% sequential decline and 3% year-on-year (y-o-y) growth in revenue to $3.65 billion. Growth was weighed down by weakness in the telecom, media, and entertainment vertical, which accounts for about a tenth of its business.

Even as net profit grew 0.4% on a sequential basis and 8.4% y-o-y to $488 million, its margins jumpe...