Indian IT Industry

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KJo
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Indian IT Industry

Post by KJo » Wed Oct 18, 2017 1:54 pm

News and Discussions about Indian IT industry, trends, risks and future.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by KJo » Wed Oct 18, 2017 1:57 pm

Slightly dated, about 6 months old, but still relevant I think.

RB, any insight into why all these "superstars" from SillyValley go to India with a lot of bluster, and end up downhill skiing back to the Valley?

My hunch is that Indian IT is basically still a low risk, play it safe place where the focus is on execution and delivery and not on ideas and innovation (which means risk and investment). I believe there are plenty of really smart innovative people in India but the culture and opportunity isn't there. Investors want guaranteed money. This does not work well with innovation.

India’s prized Silicon Valley hires keep burning out
For many years, India’s nascent startups have been turning to the West for experienced talent and mentors, offering eye-popping salaries to lure Silicon Valley professionals back home. But the allure of working in India’s burgeoning startup ecosystem has quickly evaporated for a number of senior executives.

Over the last couple of years, internet companies in Asia’s third-largest economy have witnessed a series of high-profile exits. Ex-Googler Punit Soni left Flipkart in April 2016 and last May, Snapdeal lost its chief product officer, Anand Chandrasekaran, another prized Silicon Valley hire, less than a year after he was hired. Zomato’s Namita Gupta, who made the move from Facebook in 2014, also didn’t last a year at the restaurant listing startup.

In March, Nishant Rao, the former LinkedIn India head who has also worked at the company’s Mountain View campus, put an end to his stint at Chennai-based customer support software startup Freshdesk.

All these Valley veterans were hired to lead local startups to new heights but upon their return to India, many discovered they would have to contend with a market that looked far better from the outside.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by KJo » Tue Oct 24, 2017 5:15 pm

My concern is that Indian IT companies have found something convenient "AI", "Automation", "Trump" to blame for their lack of business foresight. And even then, no business model lasts forever. We see the US littered with dead giants like Montgomery Ward, Sears (dying everyday), and even Apple was in that situation before Mahdi came back.

Old tricks may not work. People seem to think that all they have to do is learn a few things like Python and "Machine Learning" in a 2 month course and they are all set to conquer the world again.

This approach simply leads to disappointment. My prediction is Indian IT industry will shrink a lot but what will emerge will be good innovation and world class companies. Short term pain will be there.

I am worried for Modi, he will be blamed for something that was coming anyway.

India Warily Eyes AI
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/6091 ... y-eyes-ai/
Two days after K.S. Sunil Kumar received a promotion, Human Resources phoned him up and asked him to resign.

This happened in April, just as Kumar was beginning his ninth year at Tech Mahindra, one of the giants in India’s IT services industry. He worked in engineering services, where he designed components and tools for aerospace firms in North America and Europe. They’d send over specs—the materials available to construct a hinge, and the kind of load it had to bear, and the cost at which it had to be manufactured—and he mocked up options with the help of software. He was a foot soldier in the army of Indian engineers to whom work is outsourced from the West, so that it can be finished at a fraction of the expense. Sometimes he left his base, Tech Mahindra’s Bangalore campus, to serve stints at clients’ offices abroad: in Montreal, Belfast, or Stockholm.

When his employment was terminated, Kumar was earning close to $17,000 annually, a nice middle-class salary in India. Around the same time, Tech Mahindra announced profits for the previous financial year of $419 million, on revenue of $4.35 billion. (Tech Mahindra did not respond to a request for comment for this story.) IT services and related offerings in India record annual revenue of $154 billion and employ nearly four million people. The sector’s vigor has relied upon its ability to shave costs lower and lower—upon its ability to arbitrage the cheaply bought skills of workers like Sunil Kumar.

Bangalore is filled with IT professionals and engineers who resemble him. His curly hair is thin on top and gray at the temples; when we spoke he was wearing a faded checked Tommy Hilfiger shirt, a backpack, and a look of subdued anxiety. He grew up in a village a few hundred miles from Bangalore, where his father wove silk saris on a handloom. In 1995, when he was 15, he moved to Bangalore to study for a diploma in mechanical engineering; it was a step below a university degree, which he would gain later through a correspondence course.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by Singha » Thu Oct 26, 2017 5:40 am


sum
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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by sum » Thu Oct 26, 2017 1:35 pm

5 crore ( ~USD 800K) salaries for Infy Palo Alto guys?
Wow.... :shock: :shock:

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by Singha » Thu Oct 26, 2017 4:36 pm

From pix seems like a mix of young indic and sinic ppl perhaps fresh phds

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by abhik » Thu Nov 02, 2017 5:23 am

As per today's ToI the top Indian IT companies have seen employee head count remain flat over the last quarter, with only TCS and one other company seeing a slight growth. This is the time of the year that most of the passouts from engineering colleges should be joining the companies.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by KJo » Tue Jan 09, 2018 1:44 am

Cmon Pai Maam... who are you foolin'? :D

Image


http://www.firstpost.com/business/h-1b- ... 92761.html
If the proposed change in H-1B visas come into force, around 5-7 lakh Indians could be sent home. The move could directly stop hundreds of thousands of foreign workers from keeping their H-1B visas while their green card applications are pending. However, IT industry veteran Mohandas Pai demolishes that fear as a myth, stating that the move would hurt the US more because it "simply does not have the talent for the IT sector like India has".
:mrgreen:
Pai believes Indian IT professionals who are working on projects in the US are keen only on work visas. If the Trump administration does not extend their visas, senior and high-quality talent will take a beating and that would detrimental to US companies, he says.
:lol:
"We are not sending cheap labour to the US. Our IT talent comprises of highly talented people. They cannot be replaced," Pai said.

:rotfl:
"All this goes to show the deep shortage of skilled professionals in the IT sector," says Pai, adding that not extending H-1B visas would hurt the US more.
:twisted:

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by Singha » Tue Jan 09, 2018 2:22 am

abhik wrote:
Thu Nov 02, 2017 5:23 am
As per today's ToI the top Indian IT companies have seen employee head count remain flat over the last quarter, with only TCS and one other company seeing a slight growth. This is the time of the year that most of the passouts from engineering colleges should be joining the companies.
where have they vanished?

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by Sridhar k » Tue Jan 09, 2018 4:31 pm

my kbs fresher recruitment factory is grinding to an halt after a long bull run. c17s grade heavy lifting from colleges now running dorniers. Tough time for kids passing out of college

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by KJo » Tue Jan 09, 2018 6:12 pm

Unfortunately I foresee a lot of pain and frustration in the next few years. This is no different from a bubble which has burst. This would have happened even if Trump was not POTUS. Indian IT was very very lucky that it lasted about 20 years, which is very very rare. Merely saying "we will get into AI" means nothing. It's not like you can pick up yet another programming language and be the king of the hill again. Another big reason is that everyone wants to get into IT and make (perceived) big bucks. Supply is high and demand is going down for business reasons. It is no longer possible for companies to go to a college and hire the entire CS graduating class. This never happened in my graduating year in the mid 90s and only a very few ended up getting campus jobs. States like KA, TN and AP started so many Engg colleges owned by politicians of 3rd rate quality. Many have closed down now. My hometown had 2 colleges in the 90s and both were rated very high in the state. Now my town had about 6. :shock:

The positive is that people will start to give a new look to other branches of engineering which will help both the country and themselves. Not everyone loves IT and programming but still did it because of the money and perceived H&D. The ones who stick to it will be the cream of the crop and be innovative and create great companies in India.

In summary, this Reset/Reboot is good and much needed for the long term.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by Shakuni » Tue Jan 09, 2018 7:36 pm

^ Part of the problem is also that the likes of Infosys/Wipro/TCS also hire Civil and Mechanical engineers en masse, and retrain them to write code. In the mean time, they will also go give an interview to TOI-let, complaining about low quality of engineers who need to be re-trained.
Overall, it will be good for the economy if engineering talent can be re-directed to sectors that actually need them.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by KJo » Tue Jan 09, 2018 9:55 pm

Shakuni wrote:
Tue Jan 09, 2018 7:36 pm
^ Part of the problem is also that the likes of Infosys/Wipro/TCS also hire Civil and Mechanical engineers en masse, and retrain them to write code. In the mean time, they will also go give an interview to TOI-let, complaining about low quality of engineers who need to be re-trained.
Overall, it will be good for the economy if engineering talent can be re-directed to sectors that actually need them.
Yes, that was because the demand was so high around Y2K and after and the supply of CS engineers was very low. So they began to lower the standards and pull in people from Agriculture, Biology etc after making them do an NIIT course. You can only imagine what kind of software engineers they would make. It became a commodity and skill-level and aptitude went out of the window because there was so much easy money to be made. In my final year BE, I did a Group Discussion for some company (Vodafone I think), and we were so clueless about the whole process that all everyone did was shout the loudest. :lol: I did not get selected but 1-2 "toppers" did. They were the rank students. Those high standards changed dramatically. But then these companies cannot be blamed, that is how business and supply demand economics works.

There's a lot of doublespeak going on where industry "leaders" in India make angry eyes at the US saying that the US needs Indian IT more than the other way while at the same time, they :)) about Trump and H1 restrictions.

What worries me the most is that these job losses will be blamed on Modi and that might cause him to lose some votes.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by Chandragupta » Wed Jan 10, 2018 7:55 am

There is so much deadweight in Indian IT even today. Solution to every problem is just throwing more bodies at it. Many people stuck at middle level for past decade will have to be let go soon.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by Shakuni » Wed Jan 10, 2018 9:11 pm

It will be really good to see some of this engineering talent being diverted to aerospace/defense, agriculture, civil engineering, and city planning. All areas that where we could do with more people, as opposed to just writing code tests.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by Mort Walker » Wed Jan 10, 2018 10:20 pm

Shakuni wrote:
Wed Jan 10, 2018 9:11 pm
It will be really good to see some of this engineering talent being diverted to aerospace/defense, agriculture, civil engineering, and city planning. All areas that where we could do with more people, as opposed to just writing code tests.
Yes, that would be ideal. The question is - is there enough domestic industry to absorb all these people? A vast MIC could, but the services want to kill domestic weapon system platforms like the Tejas LCA and Arjun MBT, whereas they would rather import from Russia, Europe or the US.

Perhaps it is better that the best talent will no longer be attracted to IT.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by Shakuni » Thu Jan 11, 2018 3:45 am

It might also be a chicken and egg problem. Presumably with a higher quality of engineers entering these professions, the quality of goods being produced might increase, eventually leading to a higher demand for those goods. I am hopeful especially due to the private sector entering the nascent MIC in India now. Private sector lobbying is a lot more powerful than career diplomats lobbying for the same things, IMO.

Or at least one can hope.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by Mort Walker » Thu Jan 11, 2018 4:15 am

Shakuni wrote:
Thu Jan 11, 2018 3:45 am
It might also be a chicken and egg problem. Presumably with a higher quality of engineers entering these professions, the quality of goods being produced might increase, eventually leading to a higher demand for those goods. I am hopeful especially due to the private sector entering the nascent MIC in India now. Private sector lobbying is a lot more powerful than career diplomats lobbying for the same things, IMO.

Or at least one can hope.
True that. It could be like Khanland where lobbying by private MIC influences policy makers.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by abhik » Sat Jan 13, 2018 8:04 am

Job squeeze lowers attrition, improves productivity at India's IT firms

https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/ma ... 474839.cms
On Thursday, industry leader TCS reported just 3,657 employee addition in the first nine months of this financial year on a net basis, signalling an 85 per cent year-on-year drop in hirings, but reported a drop on attrition and improvement in productivity.
For the first six months of the ongoing financial year, top six Indian IT companies saw their workforce shrink by 13,402 compared with an addition of 60,240 jobs in the same period a year earlier.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by KJo » Sun Jan 14, 2018 7:31 pm

Ok, so business climate has shrunk demand of IT techies from India. How can these Indian companies continue to hire them and pay them when their cannot push them into projects? Indian IT will become another Government agency where you join and coast for life with benefits and no one can fire you for non-performance.

The Indian IT model has become obsolete. The bigwigs either are too stupid to see this or are fooling everyone by saying that this is a temporary blip and acche din is around the corner.


India’s first IT trade union registered in Pune, aims to fight ‘illegal layoffs’
http://indianexpress.com/article/cities ... s-5023587/
THE PUNE chapter of the Forum for IT Employees (FITE) has become the first officially registered trade union for the IT sector in India. FITE, which has been at the forefront of fights against massive layoffs in the sector, was registered as a trade union by the office of the state Labour Commissioner in December. An organisation of IT employees, FITE was formed in Bengaluru a few years ago to fight the layoffs in IT sector. The Forum later set up chapters in other IT hubs like Pune, Chennai and Hyderabad. It used Facebook and other social media platforms to garner support and help laid-off employees seek legal recourse.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by MehtaRahulC » Mon Jan 15, 2018 3:46 am

^^^^^

The Factory Act 1948 which has been amended dozens of times, specifically say that units confining to data processing will NOT be taken as factory. See http://www.labour.nic.in/sites/default/ ... ct1948.pdf , search for word "data processing". And many labor laws have such clauses which specifically say that "data processing units are exempt".

And there are plethora of labor laws DO NOT apply on IT companies. These amendments to exclude IT companies were brought by Sri Rajiv Gandhiji in 1980s.

IOW, State Govt could have denied registration of this trade union of IT people. But the fact that State Govt allowed shows that apex men in Govt such as Fadnavis etc now want to break IT sector in India.

So now Govts will apply labor laws on IT sector. That will wreck the hell out of IT sector. And so their ability to export will reduce. And so export business will pass into hands of SEZ based IT companies because labor laws dont apply on SEZ. And most SEZ companies are foreign owned !!! So a big chunk of IT export business will now pass in the hands of foreginers.

Aside : I support hire and fire, where contracts are interpreted and enforced by Jurors.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by Deans » Mon Jan 15, 2018 5:00 am

I'm not an IT guy but, as a former company CEO, interact with senior people in IT in India and abroad. I think there are systemic deficiencies in the way the industry manages its people (its only resource).
Most IT employees at risk from automation and tech change simply don't get that their jobs are at risk and they have to take the initiative to ensure that their skills stay relevant. I've seen far too many employees complaining that a 5% salary hike represents `mental torture' (those words are actually used in resignation letters) and resigning without a job in hand. Expectations of career & salary hikes are unrealistic.
The recruitment pool for IT companies comprises mostly engineering companies, a significant number of which are of dubious quality, run for profit and producing engineers who are either unemployable or have to be retrained. There is little attempt to look beyond engineering and recruit for e.g. B.Sc grads who have the same ability and may have more realistic salary expectations.
Apart from some BPO's there is also little attempt to move into tier 2 & 3 cities, though IT companies are better equipped to do it since their output can largely be transported electronically. That is one factor that increases manpower costs.
The H1 B visa has been misused / gamed to a significant extent in the past. It has led to bipartisan support for H1B reforms and IMO has been an own goal by the industry.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by Sachin » Mon Jan 15, 2018 8:37 am

MehtaRahulC wrote:IOW, State Govt could have denied registration of this trade union of IT people. But the fact that State Govt allowed shows that apex men in Govt such as Fadnavis etc now want to break IT sector in India.
The Factory Act of 1948 may have sections which are explicitly excluded for IT "factories". But does any act forbid the formation of a trade union? I don't think so. So why should Fadnavis (or any other CM) deny the formation of a new union? I have seen such Associations getting formed up in Bengaluru also. But all said and done, IT employees as such cannot be "unionised" like the labour class of the 1950s-1970s. The IT companies know really well on what carrots & sticks to be applied for each employee/IT worker and get them to start backstabbing each other.
Deans wrote:There is little attempt to look beyond engineering and recruit for e.g. B.Sc grads who have the same ability and may have more realistic salary expectations.
Vegetable Oil.Co actually pioneered such a scheme (with I guess KJo's favourite company also initially doing the same). Veg.Oil.Co took some good B.Sc graduates as "apprentices" and along with a job, also offered them a M.S course from BITS Pilani. During the 2002-2006 time period, these chaps were really brilliant and could beat any B.Tech-wallah hands down. Many such B.Sc graduates slogged (work & study), got their MS degrees and have now gone abroad. Some where after 2010 or so, this scheme started getting watered down. This scheme AFAIK was formally closed in 2014 or so. Veg.Oil.Co then also started hiring Diploma holders; pay scale drastically reduced but with a higher "shift allowance" to put them exclusively on Support and Maintenance projects. All I could make out from all this was that for the "Software Development" now being done in India, a good B.Sc or Diploma holder with good attitude, and good English comprehending skills is what is required.

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by MehtaRahulC » Mon Jan 15, 2018 9:13 am

When employees of a company approach Labor Commissioner for registration of a Trade Union, LC has to decide whether the employees are eligible to form Trader Union or not. Not all employees are eligible to form union. Several acts, Govt Orders and court judgments are used to decide that. And final discretion is with LC, but he works under CM, and also under courts.

Many union minded "anti-exploitation" "workers of the world unite" minded people in IT business have been trying to form Trader Union since 1980s !!! And labor commissioners turned down their application citing the clauses that data processing people are not "labor" as per factory act and other acts, and so they cannot form a trader union. They can merely form an association. But association doesnt have much power under law. So prompt was refusal of labor departments across states across India, that finally, TU people stopped trying to get IT unions get registered

Trade Unionism enable Ministers, IAS, lawyers, labor court judges and union leaders etc to extort cash from employers. This is non-political thread, so I will not detail further.

Karnataka Govt modified its labor laws making it possible for IT people for form Trade Unions some 2 years back. Next was TN. Now MH Govt has also seems to have joined the band wagon, and started allowing Trader Unionism in IT sector.

Once IT sector gets unionized, productivity will fall. We will compete with Congo and Zimbabwe.This will will mainly benefit SEZ companies which are free from labor laws. Their costs will remain low, and so export business will pass to them

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Re: Indian IT Industry

Post by JohnTitor » Mon Jan 15, 2018 3:52 pm

Mehta ji , it matters little whether these people are in a unuon ir not. If they dont perform, they will be fired. Unionisation works only in govt jobs because babus are there to fill their pockets. Private companies are there to make a profit.

In the UK many bank employees are part of a union too, but they cannot go on strike etc. Union only helps resolve pay disputes , unfair dismissal etc

On the other hand, being in a union is likely to work against you in india because future employers will not hire you.

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