IT majors on hiring spree

There has been no let-up in the domestic software majors' hiring spree, with more than 27,500 IT professionals joining the country's five biggest firms during the past three months, while the momentum is only likely to gain further.

The country's top-five club of IT players - TCS, Infosys, Wipro, Satyam Computer and HCL Technologies added a total of 27,583 employees to their pay rolls in the July-September quarter.

The robust hiring momentum has virtually shrugged off the concerns related to soaring wages eating into the company's profitability as all the five companies have reported impressive financial results for the quarter ended September 30, the experts feel.

The collective employee strength of top four IT companies - TCS, Infosys, Wipro, Satyam Computer at the end of the period was 2,37,016.

The country's second largest software exporter Infosys added 7741 employees during the June quarter, while industry leader TCS announced net addition of 6663 employees in the same period.

Earlier, Infosys had announced it plans to hire 25,000 employees this year while TCS announced it would increase the headcount by 30,500 people.

Another software major Wipro recruited 5328 employees during the July- September period this year, taking its total staff count to 61,179 employees.

During the June quarter, about 2,000 employees joined Infosys on a single day, which underlines the company's continued focus on investment in creating training and recruitment engine to meet its growth objectives.

Infosys plans to add 10,000 employees in the last two quarters of the current fiscal. During the first quarter, it had added 4,200 freshers, while the later additions stood at 2,140 employees, which excluded the job additions at the company's BPO subsidiary Progeon.

Industry experts said the robust recruitment plans of the IT companies were also aimed at offsetting the impact of high attrition rates plaguing the market.

TCS has continued to maintain the lowest attrition rate in the industry at 10.6 per cent, including BPO (10.6 per cent in Q1).

Out of the total job additions of 5328 people in IT Services business in September quarter at Wipro, which has expressed its willingness for a more aggressive stance on acquisitions, 605 employees were from their completed acquisitions during the quarter.

HCL Technologies had 3826 employees for the September quarter and reported a 11.7 per cent increase in headcount in a single quarter.

Satyam added 4025 associates in the quarter, taking the total employee strength to 31659. Total resources, including those of subsidiaries and joint ventures, increased to 34908.

According to IT industry body NASSCOM, the technology services segment would hike the employee count to 3,90,000 in 2006 and has a demand for 8,50,000 professionals and 1.4 million back office professionals by year 2010.

In 2005, Infosys, Wipro, Satyam and TCS increased their headcount by 56,000 people and have continued with robust hiring momentum since then.

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