FORMER CFO INFOSYS SAYS HIRING IN IT SECTOR TO BE SLOW

Hyderabad: Hiring in India’s IT sector will be slower in future, says a senior figure in the technology field, who also did not sound optimistic about the industry achieving 7-8% export growth in this fiscal. Former chief financial officer of Infosys Ltd, V. Balakrishnan, however, appeared positive about the industry’s growth prospects next year.

On his assessment of the performance of the IT industry in the first half of 2017-18, he said the current financial year is going to be challenging on the growth front because of “what’s happening” in the developed markets. “Hiring has definitely slowed down. And automation is a big thing because three large companies have got net negative employee growth. So, this year is going to be challenging,” Balakrishnan told PTI. But the good thing is that the US, which is the largest market for the Indian IT industry, is still doing well economically and that’s good news for it, he said.

“Also Europe is doing reasonably well. So, on the export front the demand environment may look better next year but digital is becoming big and, so, they (the IT industry) have to invest and make that transition smoothly,” he said.

On whether the sector is on track to meet the 7 to 8% export growth projected by industry body NASSCOM, he said, “I don’t know because most of the large companies are not growing at that pace. Even if you look at Infosys they have reduced their guidance.” “So, this year is going to be challenging on the growth front but probably next year demand could come back because developed markets are doing well,” he said.