Latest news with #SaiIshwarbharathB
Yahoo
09-08-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
US retailer Best Buy to boost India tech hub staff by over 40%, executive says
By Praveen Paramasivam and Sai Ishwarbharath B CHENNAI (Reuters) -U.S. electronics chain Best Buy plans to expand the headcount at its Indian tech centre by over 40% in the next few months, a senior executive told Reuters, as more global corporations set up offices in the country to tap its growing talent pool. The company, which opened its first tech centre, or global capability centre, in Bengaluru city last year, currently employs around 350 people in functions including data and artificial intelligence (AI) and is expected to grow to 500-550. GCCs, once low-cost outsourcing hubs, have evolved in the last few years and now support their parent organisations in multiple functions such as daily operations, finance, and research and development. "We will be hiring across the functions ... We will be doing a lot of digital and tech (hiring)," Nithya Subramanian, senior director data & AI COE, said on the sidelines of an event in the southern city of Chennai. The firm, known for selling electronics such as laptops, kitchen appliances and cameras, is hiring for roles including AI engineer, software engineer and product manager in India, according to its LinkedIn page. "Even if you look at the global strength, I think we are growing leaps and bounds in India," Subramanian said, noting that the Bengaluru office is Best Buy's largest tech hub and bigger than its three in the United States. Best Buy operates more than 1,000 stores in the United States and Canada, where it employs over 85,000 people. It does not have retail operations in India. The India expansion comes at a time when many global corporations are ramping up their operations in India. Reuters reported last month that Best Buy's peer Costco Wholesale plans to open its first India GCC. The domestic GCC market is likely to grow as much as $105 billion by 2030, up from $64.6 billion in fiscal 2024, an industry report showed. Sign in to access your portfolio
Time of India
08-08-2025
- Business
- Time of India
India tech giant TCS layoffs herald AI shakeup of $283 billion outsourcing sector
By Sai Ishwarbharath B and Haripriya Suresh BENGALURU: Indian outsourcing giant Tata Consultancy Services ' decision to cut over 12,000 jobs signals the start of a broader AI-fueled trend that could end up eliminating around half a million jobs over the next two to three years from the $283 billion sector, experts said. While TCS pegged the move to shed 2% of its workforce to skill mismatches rather than AI-related productivity gains, experts viewed the largest-ever layoffs by India's top private employer as the beginning of things to come in the labour-intensive sector. Roughly 12,200 TCS middle and senior management jobs will be lost. The industry, which has played a crucial role in creating a middle class in India, is increasingly seeing AI being used for everything from basic coding to manual testing and customer support. The sector employed 5.67 million people as of March 2025 and accounted for over 7% of India's GDP. It has a huge multiplier effect due to the direct and indirect jobs it creates and the cars-to-homes consumption it drives in the world's fifth-largest economy. It has historically absorbed a majority of India's engineers but that will change as rising AI use ekes out more efficiencies and demands newer skills that many current employees lack, according to half a dozen industry veterans, analysts, and staffing firms. "We are in the midst of a massive transition that will transform white-collar work as we know it," said Silicon Valley-based Constellation Research founder and chairman Ray Wang, echoing other experts who warned that more layoffs are likely on the cards. The most vulnerable employees include pure people managers with minimal tech knowledge, those in charge of testing or identifying bugs and ensuring user-friendliness before delivering software to clients, and infrastructure management staff who provide basic tech support and ensure networks and servers are working well, experts said. "About 400,000 to 500,000 professionals are at risk of being laid off over the next two to three years as their skills don't match client demands," tech market intelligence firm UnearthInsight's founder Gaurav Vasu said, adding that about 70% of those layoffs would impact workers with 4-12 years' experience. "This (fear stemming from TCS layoffs ) may hurt consumer demand for tourism, luxury shopping and even delay long-term investments such as real estate," Vasu said. TCS and its peers Infosys, HCLTech, Tech Mahindra, Wipro, LTIMindtree, and Cognizant collectively employ over 430,000 workers with 13 to 25 years of experience, according to staffing firm Xpheno. "At the moment, they may appear like the big fat middle layer," Xpheno's co-founder Kamal Karanth said. None of the IT firms responded to Reuters queries seeking comment. "With cost optimization being the key driver for new deal wins, clients are asking for productivity benefits - a trend which is also growing due to the rise in AI adoption. This requires IT firms to do more work with the same number of employees or the same work with fewer employees," Jefferies analyst Akshat Agarwal said in a research note. ADAPT OR PERISH TCS, which had more than 613,000 workers before the layoffs, said in its late July announcement it was gearing up to be "future-ready" by investing in new technologies, entering new markets, deploying AI at scale for its clients and itself, and realigning its workforce model. It did not answer Reuters queries on how many layoffs were tied to AI adoption and why it could not redeploy the affected employees. "This is very devastating news," said a 45-year-old, Kolkata-based TCS employee affected by the latest layoffs. "It is very difficult for people my age to get new jobs." Some others who are still at TCS fretted over its mediocre performance bonuses for senior employees in recent quarters, a new "bench policy" that limits the time somebody could be without a project regardless of personal circumstances or past performance, on-boarding delays, and the emotional turmoil caused by the layoffs. "All these developments have tanked the morale of mid-career folks like me," a Pune-based TCS employee said. The Indian outsourcing sector has been a key employment engine since the 1990s, offering upward mobility to millions of engineers. But revenue growth has weakened recently as its clients, stung by inflation and U.S. tariff uncertainty, defer discretionary spending and demand better cost management. "The tech industry is at an inflection point, as AI and automation move to the very core of how businesses operate," industry body Nasscom said. During past tech revolutions, disruption was felt at the organisational level. "With AI, for the first time, the onus is on the individual to reinvent or re-skill themselves," former Tech Mahindra CEO CP Gurnani said.
Yahoo
08-08-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
India tech giant TCS layoffs herald AI shakeup of $283 billion outsourcing sector
By Sai Ishwarbharath B and Haripriya Suresh BENGALURU (Reuters) -Indian outsourcing giant Tata Consultancy Services' decision to cut over 12,000 jobs signals the start of a broader AI-fueled trend that could end up eliminating around half a million jobs over the next two to three years from the $283 billion sector, experts said. While TCS pegged the move to shed 2% of its workforce to skill mismatches rather than AI-related productivity gains, experts viewed the largest-ever layoffs by India's top private employer as the beginning of things to come in the labour-intensive sector. Roughly 12,200 TCS middle and senior management jobs will be lost. The industry, which has played a crucial role in creating a middle class in India, is increasingly seeing AI being used for everything from basic coding to manual testing and customer support. The sector employed 5.67 million people as of March 2025 and accounted for over 7% of India's GDP. It has a huge multiplier effect due to the direct and indirect jobs it creates and the cars-to-homes consumption it drives in the world's fifth-largest economy. It has historically absorbed a majority of India's engineers but that will change as rising AI use ekes out more efficiencies and demands newer skills that many current employees lack, according to half a dozen industry veterans, analysts, and staffing firms. "We are in the midst of a massive transition that will transform white-collar work as we know it," said Silicon Valley-based Constellation Research founder and chairman Ray Wang, echoing other experts who warned that more layoffs are likely on the cards. The most vulnerable employees include pure people managers with minimal tech knowledge, those in charge of testing or identifying bugs and ensuring user-friendliness before delivering software to clients, and infrastructure management staff who provide basic tech support and ensure networks and servers are working well, experts said. "About 400,000 to 500,000 professionals are at risk of being laid off over the next two to three years as their skills don't match client demands," tech market intelligence firm UnearthInsight's founder Gaurav Vasu said, adding that about 70% of those layoffs would impact workers with 4-12 years' experience. "This (fear stemming from TCS layoffs) may hurt consumer demand for tourism, luxury shopping and even delay long-term investments such as real estate," Vasu said. TCS and its peers Infosys, HCLTech, Tech Mahindra, Wipro, LTIMindtree, and Cognizant collectively employ over 430,000 workers with 13 to 25 years of experience, according to staffing firm Xpheno. "At the moment, they may appear like the big fat middle layer," Xpheno's co-founder Kamal Karanth said. None of the IT firms responded to Reuters queries seeking comment. "With cost optimization being the key driver for new deal wins, clients are asking for productivity benefits - a trend which is also growing due to the rise in AI adoption. This requires IT firms to do more work with the same number of employees or the same work with fewer employees," Jefferies analyst Akshat Agarwal said in a research note. ADAPT OR PERISH TCS, which had more than 613,000 workers before the layoffs, said in its late July announcement it was gearing up to be "future-ready" by investing in new technologies, entering new markets, deploying AI at scale for its clients and itself, and realigning its workforce model. It did not answer Reuters queries on how many layoffs were tied to AI adoption and why it could not redeploy the affected employees. "This is very devastating news," said a 45-year-old, Kolkata-based TCS employee affected by the latest layoffs. "It is very difficult for people my age to get new jobs." Some others who are still at TCS fretted over its mediocre performance bonuses for senior employees in recent quarters, a new "bench policy" that limits the time somebody could be without a project regardless of personal circumstances or past performance, on-boarding delays, and the emotional turmoil caused by the layoffs. "All these developments have tanked the morale of mid-career folks like me," a Pune-based TCS employee said. The Indian outsourcing sector has been a key employment engine since the 1990s, offering upward mobility to millions of engineers. But revenue growth has weakened recently as its clients, stung by inflation and U.S. tariff uncertainty, defer discretionary spending and demand better cost management. "The tech industry is at an inflection point, as AI and automation move to the very core of how businesses operate," industry body Nasscom said. During past tech revolutions, disruption was felt at the organisational level. "With AI, for the first time, the onus is on the individual to reinvent or re-skill themselves," former Tech Mahindra CEO CP Gurnani said.
Yahoo
08-08-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
India tech giant TCS layoffs herald AI shakeup of $283 billion outsourcing sector
By Sai Ishwarbharath B and Haripriya Suresh BENGALURU (Reuters) -Indian outsourcing giant Tata Consultancy Services' decision to cut over 12,000 jobs signals the start of a broader AI-fueled trend that could end up eliminating around half a million jobs over the next two to three years from the $283 billion sector, experts said. While TCS pegged the move to shed 2% of its workforce to skill mismatches rather than AI-related productivity gains, experts viewed the largest-ever layoffs by India's top private employer as the beginning of things to come in the labour-intensive sector. Roughly 12,200 TCS middle and senior management jobs will be lost. The industry, which has played a crucial role in creating a middle class in India, is increasingly seeing AI being used for everything from basic coding to manual testing and customer support. The sector employed 5.67 million people as of March 2025 and accounted for over 7% of India's GDP. It has a huge multiplier effect due to the direct and indirect jobs it creates and the cars-to-homes consumption it drives in the world's fifth-largest economy. It has historically absorbed a majority of India's engineers but that will change as rising AI use ekes out more efficiencies and demands newer skills that many current employees lack, according to half a dozen industry veterans, analysts, and staffing firms. "We are in the midst of a massive transition that will transform white-collar work as we know it," said Silicon Valley-based Constellation Research founder and chairman Ray Wang, echoing other experts who warned that more layoffs are likely on the cards. The most vulnerable employees include pure people managers with minimal tech knowledge, those in charge of testing or identifying bugs and ensuring user-friendliness before delivering software to clients, and infrastructure management staff who provide basic tech support and ensure networks and servers are working well, experts said. "About 400,000 to 500,000 professionals are at risk of being laid off over the next two to three years as their skills don't match client demands," tech market intelligence firm UnearthInsight's founder Gaurav Vasu said, adding that about 70% of those layoffs would impact workers with 4-12 years' experience. "This (fear stemming from TCS layoffs) may hurt consumer demand for tourism, luxury shopping and even delay long-term investments such as real estate," Vasu said. TCS and its peers Infosys, HCLTech, Tech Mahindra, Wipro, LTIMindtree, and Cognizant collectively employ over 430,000 workers with 13 to 25 years of experience, according to staffing firm Xpheno. "At the moment, they may appear like the big fat middle layer," Xpheno's co-founder Kamal Karanth said. None of the IT firms responded to Reuters queries seeking comment. "With cost optimization being the key driver for new deal wins, clients are asking for productivity benefits - a trend which is also growing due to the rise in AI adoption. This requires IT firms to do more work with the same number of employees or the same work with fewer employees," Jefferies analyst Akshat Agarwal said in a research note. ADAPT OR PERISH TCS, which had more than 613,000 workers before the layoffs, said in its late July announcement it was gearing up to be "future-ready" by investing in new technologies, entering new markets, deploying AI at scale for its clients and itself, and realigning its workforce model. It did not answer Reuters queries on how many layoffs were tied to AI adoption and why it could not redeploy the affected employees. "This is very devastating news," said a 45-year-old, Kolkata-based TCS employee affected by the latest layoffs. "It is very difficult for people my age to get new jobs." Some others who are still at TCS fretted over its mediocre performance bonuses for senior employees in recent quarters, a new "bench policy" that limits the time somebody could be without a project regardless of personal circumstances or past performance, on-boarding delays, and the emotional turmoil caused by the layoffs. "All these developments have tanked the morale of mid-career folks like me," a Pune-based TCS employee said. The Indian outsourcing sector has been a key employment engine since the 1990s, offering upward mobility to millions of engineers. But revenue growth has weakened recently as its clients, stung by inflation and U.S. tariff uncertainty, defer discretionary spending and demand better cost management. "The tech industry is at an inflection point, as AI and automation move to the very core of how businesses operate," industry body Nasscom said. During past tech revolutions, disruption was felt at the organisational level. "With AI, for the first time, the onus is on the individual to reinvent or re-skill themselves," former Tech Mahindra CEO CP Gurnani said.
Yahoo
24-07-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Infosys raises annual revenue forecast on financial services boost
By Sai Ishwarbharath B and Haripriya Suresh BENGALURU (Reuters) -India's No.2 IT services provider Infosys raised the floor of its annual revenue forecast on Wednesday after reporting stronger-than-expected quarterly sales, as its financial services segment got a fillip from AI deals and market-share gains. The Bengaluru-based company narrowed its revenue growth forecast to 1% to 3% from a prior range of flat to 3%, in line with analysts' expectations. Global interest rate cuts by central banks could boost India's $283-billion IT industry, where the banking and financial services segment contributes about a third of total revenue. "We have seen a lot of the discussions on the economy worldwide coming to a more stable situation but it is not fully settled," said Salil Parekh, CEO of Infosys. The company is seeing "strong traction" in financial services segment, Parekh said in a post-earnings conference, adding that logistics and manufacturing orders were being hit by the macroeconomic environment. Infosys' consolidated sales rose 7.5% year-on-year to 422.79 billion rupees ($4.9 billion) in the June quarter, while analysts, on average, had expected revenue of 418.06 billion rupees, as per data compiled by LSEG. "Infosys has done better on revenue front compared to its larger rival Tata Consultancy Services. The outperformance is due to solid deals won in the previous quarters," said Ambrish Shah, an analyst at Systematix. Revenue from the firm's financial services segment rose for the fifth consecutive quarter, helped by marquee deal wins including Bank of Sydney, Metro Bank, and AIB. The IT firm's net profit rose 8.7% in the three-month period to 69.21 billion rupees, mainly due to lower depreciation and communication expenses. Analysts had expected 67.55 billion rupees of profit, as per data compiled by LSEG. Net new bookings rose $3.8 billion during the quarter, compared with $2.6 billion in the previous quarter and $4.1 billion in the year-ago period. Earlier this month, IT industry bellwether TCS missed revenue estimates and flagged delays in decision making and project starts. Smaller rivals and Tech Mahindra have fared better than large rivals. Infosys' U.S.-listed shares were up 1.6% in pre-market trade. ($1 = 86.3880 Indian rupees)
