The IT recruitment scene these days is buzzing with activity. The top three multinational software/BPO firms, IBM, Cognizant and Accenture possibly added more people to their Indian operations than the top three Indian IT/BPO companies TCS, Infosys and Wipro. While the net additions made by TCS, Infosys and Wipro to their headcount in 2006 were more than those by IBM, Cognizant and Accenture, discounting the numbers for onsite deployment reveals a different picture.
In 2006, the Indian IT firms together added 55,758 people globally  TCS 20,596, Infosys 20,010 and Wipro 15,152. At the same time, their MNC counterparts recruited close to 41,400 in India. IBM ramped up its India workforce by 14,500 while Cognizant added 14,550 people globally, with three-fourths of its total workforce deployed in India.
For Accenture, these figures are only available with a one-month lag. Between the end of January 2006 and January 2007,Accenture stepped up the recruitment ante by hiring more than 16,000 people in India.
There is a crucial difference between these two sets of numbers, though  global vs Indian. For pure-play Indian IT companies, the numbers are global and include people working in subsidiaries abroad and at on-site projects. For MNCs IBM and Accenture, the numbers relate to Indian operations.
Discounting the non-India component for Indian IT companies at 30%  on-site effort for Infosys and Wipro in 2006 was a little over 30% whereas TCS doesn’t give that figure  pure-play Indian companies added a little over 39,000 people to their domestic operations. This is against 41,400 people in the case of MNC IT companies. This is after discounting 25% on-site effort for Cognizant and taking the net additions of IBM and Accenture.
This should not come as a surprise. It’s, in fact, part of a bigger trend. Even five years ago, pure-play Indian IT companies had maintained that they increasingly found themselves competing with MNCs for some of the projects, indicating that the customer segments for MNCs and Indian players were converging. Eventually, when IBM and Accenture announced the plans to tap India as a resource base, the trend became much clearer.
The present trend is expected to become stronger in the days to come. For example, Accenture may take its headcount to 35,000 by August 2007, 52% over the same period last year. “We have built Accenture into a powerful global brand  and we intend to be a leading brand and an employer of choice in India.
There is a tremendous opportunity for Accenture to work with the talented people in India to help our clients compete on the world stage. We are also keen to build our domestic business here,†Sandeep Arora, lead executive, Accenture Delivery Centres for Technology, India, said.
Cut to IBM. Since June 2006, IBM has set up 10 new IBM global delivery centres in India in Kolkata, Chennai, Bangalore, Pune, Hyderabad, Chandigarh, Gurgaon, IBM spokesperson said. “India is home to IBM’s largest service delivery teams that provide end-to-end services to clients globally  across remote infrastructure management, application services and business transformation outsourcing,†she said.
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Source:Economic Times
