Hiring by IT firms returns as AI-led disruptions stabilise

The Indian IT industry is slowly coming back to its usual way of doing things. This is at least true as headcount addition is concerned. Since last year, apocalyptic predictions have dominated the headlines as the AI wave swept the world. Many said that Indian IT firms would have to fire people in hordes as their business model would be severely impacted. Numbers started floating on how many job roles would be redundant in two to three years. As the world is on the verge of exiting 2025, such predictions are coming true.

Of course, the Indian IT industry’s ways of doing things have changed a lot as they had to keep up with the fast-evolving dynamics in the AI domain. In recent quarters, earnings of domestic IT services firms are getting stabilised. With operations stabilising and revenue growth coming back, IT companies are back in campuses. Campus visits of some IT companies have started. Pre-placement offers are also issued to students. This brings cheer in the engineering college campuses and makes for a welcome change from last year’s washout. As the campus season picks up momentum, many feel that it will be better than last year.

Numbers given by Indian IT companies are supportive of this trend. For instance, Infosys has hired around 12,000 freshers in the first half of FY26 and is on track to hire 20,000 freshers for the full fiscal year. HCLTech added 5,196 freshers during the second quarter of the ongoing financial year. Similarly, Wipro onboarded 2,900 freshers between July and September All these companies have sounded positive about fresher hiring in 2025-26. This is notable as many analysts have predicted that entry-level jobs would completely vanish from the market because of AI-led automation.

This trend has happened. Many entry-level repetitive tasks have been automated. But another trend has also emerged. While AI has led to automation of certain tasks, it has also created new job roles within the IT industry. Now, freshers are being hired for emerging technology skills like artificial intelligence, machine learning, data science, cloud engineering, and related fields. It is, therefore, necessary that engineering graduates should be trained in emerging skillsets. Not only in fresher hiring space, hiring of laterals (experienced professionals) have slowly increased in the recent quarter. During the second quarter ended September, most big and mid-tier IT firms have shown an uptick in their headcount.

Usually, such addition is seen as a precursor to momentum in the revenue growth. It has already been seen that the deal pipeline of Indian IT firms has been constantly maintained. Though revenue conversion has been poor so far, it is noticed that deal pipeline has been improving. It means when more projects are implemented, IT firms will require more resources. Apart from these factors, India has emerged as a GCC hub. More and more foreign companies are setting up their technology centres in India every quarter. Around 1,800 GCCs have already been established, which is likely to touch 3,000 by 2030. These GCCs have been the real engine behind increased hiring in recent years.

They are not only hiring in good numbers but also recruiting people for advanced skills. It is certain in keeping with its tag as an innovation hub for global firms, hiring for tech talent will certainly grow in India, putting to shade all doomsday predictions. Though hiring may not happen in very large numbers in the coming three years, this will definitely happen for new age skill sets. And India’s role as a talent hub for the global technology industry will continue.