In September, Suraj logged into the Slack online platform at the cryptocurrency startup he worked for and found the channel’s workforce plummeting. A few hours later he was also suddenly blocked.
“I was promoted and was due to be promoted” IndiaBangalore, the tech capital of , asked not to use their real names to avoid compromising future employment opportunities.
Expert recruiter Xpheno estimates that Suraj is one of up to 25,000 people who will lose their jobs in India’s burgeoning tech sector this year. A slowdown in funding has slashed budgets, slashing competition from his established IT services firms.
Job cuts this year reflect a lack of funding in India’s once-thriving tech scene. The country’s startups raised $24.7 billion from January to November this year, according to data provider Tracxn. Start-up Fundraising hit a record high.
Tracxn co-founder Neha Singh said:
The trend reflects a wave of technology-related job cuts around the world, including US giants such as Amazon and Meta scaling back in response to the global economic slowdown.
Over the past decade, Silicon Valley groups have increased employment in India, attracted by the plethora of computer programmers and science graduates, and further developed the country’s tech sector, especially around Bangalore.
But now, despite having an MBA from a reputable business school, it’s hard to land a new role, as Suraj has found. Job activity in India’s IT sector rebounded slightly last month, but still fell 14% year-on-year, tracked by job site FoundIt. “Surge”, highlighting the mismatch between supply and demand.
The slowdown in employment comes amid mass layoffs by some of India’s most prominent start-ups. SoftBank-backed hotel booking group Oyo will cut 10% of its 3,700 employees, the company said this month. He said he would lay off 5%. Zomato, which lists food delivery apps, says less than 3% of its employees have been laid off for “performance-based churn.” Zomato does not disclose the number of employees.
Some observers have blamed technology investors such as SoftBank and Tiger Global. These companies invest heavily in start-up Indian companies and encourage them to spend cash in search of growth over profit.
Nikhil Kamath, co-founder of online brokerage firm Zerodha and investment manager True Beacon, said: “I’m sure tech companies everywhere are overstaffed, but that’s one factor in the funding they have access to. ‘ said. “Ventures He often blames capital and PE funds because they push many start-ups to spend their money as soon as possible.”
However, according to industry insiders, the demand for developers and software engineers remains high in India.
For people with technical and product role experience, “There are about 10. [companies] We are waiting to hire them,” said Sanjay Swamy, managing partner at Prime Ventures in Bangalore, adding that sales and support staff are struggling to get new jobs.
“Salary increases are slowing… but they were overheating like crazy,” he added.
The burgeoning start-up sector, with start-ups ranging from online learning to fintech, draws seasoned talent from India’s strong IT outsourcing firms such as Infosys, one of India’s largest listed companies by market capitalization, and Tata Consultancy Services. I was looking for workers.
Competition for talent has empowered employees in the hiring process. Just a year ago, an IT outsourcer employee was negotiating a 60-70% pay raise for him due to a lateral job change, according to a Jefferies survey. Banks have found that it has now eased to 20-30%.
Suraj said a few months ago his LinkedIn feed was filled with workers complaining about layoffs. “People appreciate a great onboarding process in HR now,” he joked, signaling that power is back in the hands of employers.
Meanwhile, jobs in India by big tech companies such as Amazon, Apple, Facebook parent Meta, Netflix and Google parent Alphabet have plummeted. According to Xpheno, these companies posted 9,000 active job listings for him in August. That number is now below 2,000.
Amazon has closed several operations in India in the past few months, including an edtech and food delivery venture. As part of its global restructuring, Twitter has laid off its entire team in India, including public relations.
“When I got fired, I regretted not joining Instagram,” says Suraj. “Then meth fired people and I’m like OK…nowhere is safe anymore.”
