IT sector can weather storm: Nasscom

New Delhi: IT industry body Nasscom on Thursday said the sector continues to be a net hirer of skilled talent, and that the top-5 Indian IT companies are planning to add over 96,000 employees in 2021-22.

The statement comes in the backdrop of a report by Bank of America (BoA) that said domestic software firms are set to slash 30 lakh jobs by 2022 as automation gains pace across industries, especially in the tech space.

"With the evolution of technology and increasing automation, the nature of traditional IT jobs and roles will evolve overall leading to creation of newer jobs. The industry continues to be a net hirer of skilled talent, adding 1,38,000 people in FY2021," Nasscom said in a statement. It asserted that players have robust hiring plans for 2021-22 with the top-5 Indian IT companies planning to add over 96,000 employees.

"The industry is upskilling more than 250,000 employees in digital skills and has hired more than 40,000 fresh digitally-trained talent, indicating at its commitment and investment towards rapid enhancement of workforce capabilities...With one of the strongest deal pipeline, and strong business outlook, the industry is on track to meet its vision of $300-350 billion revenues by 2025," Nasscom said.

It added that the industry will continue to be a net creator of jobs and is "committed to people-centric innovation, relentless talent focus", and delivering a superior transformative customer experience. Nasscom pointed out that the business process management (BPM) sector in India, which has been called out as the sector ripe for automation, employs over 1.4 million people (excluding domestic and in-house) and not 9 million as the said report suggested.

The IT-BPM sector overall employs 4.5 million people as of March 2021, it added. The association noted that automation and RPA (robotic process automation) has been maturing in the last three years and has led to a net creation of jobs for the BPM sector. The addressable opportunity for BPM according to a Nasscom-McKinsey Report is $180-220 billion, leaving significant headroom for growth and jobs, Nasscom added.