Indian companies are shifting and changing to face market reality

With a focus on efficiency, innovation, and strategic workforce planning, the Indian Information Technology (IT) sector is likely to see changes in job growth and flat revenue growth.
The £283- billion revenue-generating sector is witnessing a metamorphosis of sorts as the world is changing. This will affect both revenue growth and talent acquisition. It is inevitable that Indian IT must move beyond headcount and get quality professionals. There may not be any kind of mass hiring in the future. Proliferation of AI (artificial intelligence) is one of the factors in the slowdown of recruitment.
Six leading IT companies added only 3,847 positions during April-June, representing a substantial 72% reduction from 13,935 recruitments in the previous quarter, according to recent financial reports. Entry-level recruitment has decreased by 50% compared to pre-pandemic levels.
To overcome changing needs of the consumers, the Indian IT companies are investing in key areas such as cloud transformation, data analytics, generative AI, cybersecurity, engineering research and customised requirements of its clients to become more effective. This will prepare the sector to stay competitive and meet evolving client demands. Emerging technologies hold key the growth.
The IT software industry has been re-aligning its offerings to cater to the evolving nature of the market.
The Indian IT industry was built on numbers—huge contracts and sub contracts, thousands of engineers, sprawling campuses, and a pipeline of fresh graduates constituted the successful delivery model. But, we may have come to the end of that model of mammoth figures.
This end is not being mourned by forward-looking tech leaders. They see a quality sector driven by specific output models and niche product delivery and excellence.
Earlier this month, HCLTech said it was restructuring its workforce due to skill and location mismatches. Now, the layoffs are drawing public scrutiny, as the industry grapples with an AI-inflected shift in both business models and manpower requirements.
Meanwhile, NASSCOM former chairman Ganesh Natarajan sees the shift as long overdue and inevitable. Quoting the World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs report, he noted that while millions of jobs will be made redundant, a new class of jobs will emerge.
“My own bet is that a million roles in IT—testing, documentation, low-level coding—will become redundant. But equally, we’ll see new roles being created,” he said.