Fresher hiring intent in India's telecom sector at 45% in 1H25
New Delhi: The Indian telecom sector continues its stable trajectory in workforce demand, with
fresher hiring intent
standing at 45% in the first half of 2025, according to a report on Thursday.
The report (based on HY1, that is, January-June 2025) by
TeamLease EdTech
showed that telecom remains a significant employment generator as the sector rapidly transitions to 5G networks, cloud-native architecture, and enhanced cyber resilience.
While the sector witnessed a marginal decline from the 48% freshers hiring intent reported in the previous half-year (July-December 2024), the momentum remains robust, driven by demand for specialised roles like radiofrequency (RF) engineers,
network security
analysts, and field technical engineers.
Cities like Delhi, Ahmedabad, Coimbatore, Bangalore, Mumbai, Nagpur, Hyderabad Kolkata, and Indore are seeing a high demand for these roles.
Freshers can find varied opportunities in the sector but with domain-specific skills, particularly in network security,
cloud computing
, and DevOps.
Essential tech tools like project management software and task-tracking platforms are also considered vital by employers to streamline complex network deployment and management functions.
"Though the sector is expanding, employers are not just hiring to scale operations. They wish to future-proof their networks with specialized talent. This is where freshers with targeted certifications in RF, cybersecurity, and cloud ecosystems stand out," said Shantanu Rooj, Founder and CEO of TeamLease Edtech.
"We're also seeing telecom roles blend with IT and data functions, creating hybrid job profiles that didn't exist a few years ago. It's a signal for academic institutions to realign curriculum and for aspirants to skill up with agility," Rooj added.
Besides technical skills, aspirants also need to focus on associated soft skills, including analytical reasoning, adaptability, and interpersonal communication.
The report comes ahead of World Telecom Day, observed every year on May 17, to increase global awareness about the societal changes brought by the internet and new technologies.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Mint
11 minutes ago
- Mint
Plenty of courtships, but no one's tying a knot in Indian edtech
India's mid-stage edtech startups are finding no takers. Once the darlings of investors in 2021, Indian edtech firms—especially in the series A to C stages—are now struggling to raise fresh funds or secure strategic buyers, Mint has learnt. Startups at these stages recorded just three deals totalling $9 million so far in 2025—a staggering drop from $852 million across 50 deals in 2021—according to data provider Venture Intelligence, on the back of slowing demand for online learning and adjacent edtech models post-pandemic. As venture capital dries up, many of these companies are increasingly turning to larger peers for potential mergers or acquisitions to survive and scale. 'We're witnessing a surge in M&A interest across both digital and brick-and-mortar education segments… Smaller companies recognise that joining a larger platform can offer better exit potential," said Varun Gupta, managing director at Avendus, who advises on edtech deals. Gupta noted that several bootstrapped assets—those built with little or no external capital—have scaled profitably and are now attractive M&A targets. Also Read: Capillary Tech to file IPO documents by October; Warburg, others to trim stake Despite increased conversations, deal closures remain elusive. Only seven M&As have occurred in 2025 so far, compared to 46 in 2021. M&A activity in edtech has sharply declined since its peak four years ago of 46 deals worth $3.36 billion. In 2022, deals remained high at 49, but their value dropped to $1.05 billion. The slowdown deepened in 2023 (23 deals, $104 million) and 2024 (12 deals, $138 million). In 2025 so far, only seven deals worth $37 million have been recorded, reflecting continued caution and consolidation. The average size of such deals has also nosedived—from $73 million in 2021 to $5.2 million this year. Unfinished agenda Some recent deals that did close include Imarticus Learning's $6 million acquisition of MyCaptain and FinX's $2 million buyout of BSE Institute. 'Market conditions, such as economic climate and investor sentiment, often lead to valuation disagreements, making negotiations complex. For example, median revenue multiples for edtech companies were around 1.6x in Q4 2024, reflecting a cautious approach by investors," said Nikhil Barshikar, founder and CEO, Imarticus Learning. However, many high-profile acquisition talks are falling through. After an unrealised deal with Allen, Unacademy is now looking to hive off Airlearn, asMintearlier reported. Similarly, Simplilearn, another company said to be exploring a sale,Mintreported earlier, has not found any takers yet. Well-capitalised players, or potential buyers, are approaching M&As cautiously. Physics Wallah's negotiations to acquire Drishti IAS fell apart recently, Entrackr reported last week. Others are choosing to grow organically. 'There are too many companies in each segment of the sector, many without sustainable or scalable business models. What the industry needs now is a period of contraction," said Ronnie Screwvala, chairperson and co-founder, upGrad. 'This means to hold on for the next 18 months to see who will be around without funding, as many will perish," he added. Since 2021, close to 16 funded edtech players like Stoa, Dojo, Bluelearn and Udayy have shut shop, Tracxn data showed. Screwvala also warned that prematurely consolidating with startups that lack viable business models may lead to larger issues later. Also Read: Flexiloans to expand lending offerings, enter insurance post ₹665 crore funding Akshay Chaturvedi, founder and CEO of talent mobility platform said he dropped acquisition plans after evaluating two companies earlier this year after failing to reach an agreement on valuation benchmarks. He declined to name the firms, citing confidentiality. 'We're evaluating companies, but there's continued back and forth on valuations as many are missing their revenue and profit targets," said Chaturvedi. He is looking for acquisitions to grow in Europe and Southeast Asia, and other markets in the revenue range of $10-15 million. What's blocking deals? The hesitation stems from both valuation mismatches and concerns over stable profits in these companies. 'Non-scaled business models don't lead to meaningful or long-term value-accretive M&As. These often turn out to be top-line buyouts that eventually fade, as they aren't sustainable or profitable," said Screwvala. He added that in many of these cases, the growth trajectories look unusually steep and have, in most cases, tapered off. Many startups that raised capital in 2021 at inflated valuations are now unable to justify them with current metrics, making acquirers hesitant. Also Read: Sheela Foam plans to infuse capital in Furlenco as furniture rental market expands Still, investors believe the M&A logjam will ease in the next few years, for firms in the $100-500 million valuation range that have achieved scale. 'We think strategic or financial transactions are a possibility in the coming years…Most of the companies with decent scale—$25 million revenue—are breakeven and/or have cash to get to breakeven," said Mujtaba Wani, principal at GSV Ventures, an edtech-focused global VC firm. 'So the catalyst for M&A will have to be individual initiative."
Time of India
17 minutes ago
- Time of India
'Indian income tax sleuths have no way to tax digital value loop'
Indian tax authorities are staring at a growing revenue loss in digital tax collection as artificial intelligence (AI) firms such as OpenAI , Anthropic and Perplexity generate income at a fast clip from Indian developers, companies and startups, despite having no physical presence in the country, reigniting long-standing concerns over the concept of 'permanent establishment' in the digital economy. The companies are earning millions of dollars from Indian developers, startups and enterprises who access their AI models-eg ChapGPT, Claude, Perplexity etc-through paid APIs and subscriptions but they operate without local offices, employees, or servers in India, allowing them to bypass the country's tax obligations entirely. Then there is also an additional conundrum of how to tax AI models that continuously extract important insights and information from Indian-origin data-users, startups and companies-but the revenue is generated and taxed in a different geography. by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Linh Dong: Unsold Furniture Liquidation 2024 (Prices May Surprise You) Unsold Furniture | Search Ads Learn More Undo ETtech Tax experts say Indian tax authorities currently have no way to tax the 'digital value loop'. Live Events Experts feel that the India tax framework, which was created around the concept of physical presence, such as offices, employees, or equipment, is struggling to keep up with the new emerging software business models. And the current predicament has renewed the discussion over interpreting 'nexus'-the legal basis for taxing foreign entities-as algorithms obfuscate borders and challenge old tax concepts. "The digitalisation of the economy has posed serious challenges to the existing international tax system, primarily due to the ability of digital businesses to scale in a jurisdiction without any physical presence, and their heavy reliance on intangibles and the value created by user-contributed data," said Akhilesh Ranjan, adviser, tax and regulatory services at Price Waterhouse & Co LLP. Discover the stories of your interest Blockchain 5 Stories Cyber-safety 7 Stories Fintech 9 Stories E-comm 9 Stories ML 8 Stories Edtech 6 Stories He added the current international tax architecture, which was based entirely on physical presence and where allocation of profits was governed by the separate entity concept and the arm's length standard, has been shown to have become incapable of providing complete answers to questions of 'nexus', characterisation and a fair and equitable allocation of income. The tax headache is only going to grow bigger as AI-related business activity in India is quickly gaining traction, with startups across sectors integrating AI through API subscriptions, while larger companies invest heavily in AI-powered automation and analytics tools. 'The issue with AI models isn't very different from the unresolved software taxation problem. For example, if someone in the US licenses software for use in India, India currently can't tax that income. Based on Supreme Court rulings, such payments are not considered as royalty, and furthermore, the previous equalisation levy that was applicable has been withdrawn. Since there's no permanent establishment either, the income remains untaxed. So, we end up in a similar situation with AI—where there may be an income source from India, but under existing treaty obligations, the country cannot tax it,' said Rohinton Sidhwa, leader, global business tax, Deloitte India. This is part of a larger problem Pillar One was meant to solve, but geopolitical pushback—especially from the US—has stalled, he added. 'As long as treaties don't define software or AI payments as royalties or establish a clear nexus, countries like India can't tax this income, even if it's sourced from their own markets,' he said. Under the OECD-led international tax reform, Pillar One allocated a chunk of profits from large multinational companies, especially those offering digital services, to market countries, allowing them to tax these firms even without a physical presence. Experts say India is already playing an active role in ongoing United Nations efforts to develop a new framework for taxing cross-border digital services. 'It must continue to pursue multilateral consensus on the 'physical presence' test being supplemented by 'the place of generation of user data'; arm's length transfer pricing giving way to a formulary approach based on revenue sourcing; and the debate on the relative primacy of 'source' versus 'residence' being shifted to a discussion on the extent to which income taxation should be based on the situs of value creation and of consumption,' said Ranjan.
Time of India
17 minutes ago
- Time of India
AI firms are hyping up threat to coders to push their model sales
Anshul Ramachandran , founding team member at artificial intelligence (AI) coding platform Windsurf , said he believes that the idea that AI will replace software developers is a narrative being overhyped by some AI founders and chief executives largely to push their model sales. 'My personal belief is that most of them wanted to fire a lot of people anyways, and AI is a very good excuse,' Ramachandran told ET in an exclusive interview. 'And then I think some of these folks leading model companies have some incentive as well—they're building models that are for software engineering. That's like very much a business tactic to sell more models.' The California-headquartered AI-assisted coding platform, which was valued at $3 billion within a year of launch, is reportedly in talks for acquisition by OpenAI . The company has seen India emerge as its second-largest market after the US, both in terms of developer adoption and enterprise partnerships, Ramachandran said. 'There are close to 17 million developers in India and there's very real energy for adopting the latest and greatest AI,' Ramachandran said. 'We're expanding our team there and actively thinking about building GPU clusters in India.' He said the company is working with every leading IT company in India at various levels. Discover the stories of your interest Blockchain 5 Stories Cyber-safety 7 Stories Fintech 9 Stories E-comm 9 Stories ML 8 Stories Edtech 6 Stories Moreover, Indian IT companies are disrupting themselves faster than their international peers by using more AI, he said. But, he added, that only means a lot more software will now be created out of India because these companies have already made technology a differentiator. Windsurf is also considering offering special pricing for a cost-sensitive market like India, Ramachandran said, particularly for enterprises. 'We've always provided a very generous free tier. And part of that rationale is, even in markets like India, we want to be able to democratise the technology,' he said. While work in the future will be AI-assisted, humans will remain in the driver's seat, according to Ramachandran. AI-based tools like Windsurf have the potential to reduce the number of people needed to do the same work, which could be viewed negatively, he said. 'It's actually been quite the opposite. People see it as an opportunity to have more business.' He added that we will create ten times more software and, therefore, always need 'engineering 101' and investments in the workforce. 'That's where the counterintuitive part comes in, because every incremental hire you make now can actually create even more software than before,' he said. On Windsurf's rapid growth, Ramachandran said the company was at 'the right place at the right time'. 'We chose a problem space that we understood that ended up being of great value,' he said. 'We were an infra company before we were even an AI company, so our background in GPU infra has absolutely helped us.'
