Intel says no hiring plans in India in 'foreseeable future'

Company announces $120-million expansion of R&D facility at Bangalore

Multinational semiconductor chip maker Intel Corp, which currently has about 4,500 employees in India, is not looking at any further hiring in the country in the 'foreseeable future', Intel India President Kumud Srinivasan today said.

The comment comes after the US-headquartered company last week announced a decision to reduce its global headcount by 5%, amid falling personal-computer sales and as the company looks to shift its focus to faster growing areas. The company globally has around 107,000 employees.

“We are not announcing a layoff. Business groups are developing plans to reduce spending and this will include some reduction in headcount at a global level. In addition, we are realigning and refocusing our resources to meet the needs of the business,” Srinivasan said. “When we talk about reduction of the workforce there are a number of things that can happen. It could include redeployments, voluntary programs, retirements, and through attrition. The usual rate of attrition is close to 4 percent worldwide…We have no plans for fresh hiring (in India), certainly in 2014 and not even in the foreseeable future.”

Even as Srinivasan said it was too early to understand the impact of this global headcount reduction decision on Intel's India operations, she said, the impact on Indian operations would be the same as other geographies, and “there will not be anything exceptional here”.

“We generally see a four% attrition anyway, and this (five percent reduction) is a bit of a stretch above and beyond that,” she said. “We will use many different initiatives to get to that number, including redeployment and voluntary retirement.”

Separately, Intel today announced expansion of its existing research and development (R&D) center at Bangalore with an investment of $120 million (around Rs 742.5 crore). The company currently has two buildings at its campus at Sarjapur in Bangalore covering 25 acres, and the new building will spread across 18 acres. It is likely to be completed by mid-2015.

The new building, land for which land was acquired at the time of initial land purchase around 2002, will have 60,000 sq meters of built up area.

“Today in Bangalore we have few owned and few leased properties, this expansion is going to allow us essentially to consolidate our employees on to our owned property,” Srinivasan said. Most of the company's 4,500 employees in India are based out of Bangalore.

The company, which set up its first sales office in India in 1988, has so far invested over $2 billion in India.

“The Indian center makes significant contributions to the entire product portfolio offered by Intel,” Srinivasan said. “Our new capacity in Bangalore will give us the right resources to make a meaningful difference as the company moves into exciting areas like the Internet of Things.”