 "India's top 5 IT firms continue headcount decline for 7th straight quarter")
For the seventh consecutive quarter, India’s top five IT services firms have experienced a decline in headcount. However, the slower pace of this reduction in the April-June quarter has generated optimism that these companies may end the financial year with a net increase in their workforce, according to a report by the Economic Times.
In the first quarter ending June 30, the total number of employees at Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys, Wipro, HCLTech, and Tech Mahindra dropped by 2,034, compared to the previous quarter, the quarterly data released in July showed. Notably, Tata Consultancy Services, Wipro, and Tech Mahindra reported net increases in their employee numbers.
The news report quoted Deepti S, business head of technology staff augmentation at staffing company Xpheno saying, “The gradual slowdown of the degrowth with the quantum of the headcount drop reducing over the last five quarters is a positive movement.”
With three of the top five companies showing an increase in headcount by the end of the quarter, there is a strong possibility of a recovery this financial year, the report quoted her saying.
Despite the challenging business conditions in their primary markets, the US and Europe, Indian IT services firms have reduced hiring in recent quarters. However, their first-quarter results and outlook indicate potential improvement, even if the situation remains below normal levels, the report said.
Collectively, these five companies concluded the first quarter of financial year 2025 with a total headcount of 1.523 million, as compared to 1.525 million at the end of March.
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TCS led the ranking with total 606,998 employees, while Infosys came in second with 315,332 employees. The news report quoted a Wipro spokesperson reporting an increase in its headcount in Q1FY25.
“During this quarter, we have also onboarded approximately 3,000 new gen associates (NGAs) to whom offers had been made earlier. In FY25, we foresee an overall intake of 10,000-12,000 NGAs and in addition will hire in the areas of GenAI, cybersecurity and cloud,” the spokesperson said, as cited in the report.
HCLTech Chief People Officer Ramachandran Sundararajan said that the company concluded FY24 with a workforce of 227,481 employees, and the employee count grew during the fourth quarter of the financial year 2024.
In the first quarter of FY25, the company reduced its workforce by just over 8,000 employees. According to Xpheno, the combined workforce of the five companies was 49,363 fewer at the end of the June quarter compared to the same period last year. Over the past two years, their workforce has decreased by 3 per cent, though it has grown by 18 per cent compared to three years ago, Deepti said.
During the 12 months ending June 2021, the IT sector saw an increase of 151,000 employees compared to the previous year, the report said.