Davos 2023: IT services industry has ample opportunities in mid to long term, says HCLTech’s C Vijaykumar

“We continue to hire and in the next 12 months, we will hire another 30,000 freshers. That plan is still intact,” he said.

The IT services industry has a lot of opportunities in the mid to long term, contrary to a view that expects the industry’s growth to slow down going forward due to a lack of new disruptive tech drivers, said HCLTech’s chief executive officer C Vijaykumar.

“First is the current opportunity landscape, which is driven around efficiency, vendor consolidation. Digital transformation is still much longer term, it's got a lot more legs to go. Third is really a lot of investment that is going into sustainability. It's believed that sustainable solutions and services will be a $10 trillion kind of opportunity in the next decade,” he told Moneycontrol on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos.

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CVK added that while there may be moderation due to economic environment, it's very promising that the industry was growing in double digits even before COVID, and in the long term there are still opportunities.

The CEO mentioned they went into Davos with a bit of a pessimistic view on what’s expected in 2023, but there was a lot of optimism when they started talking to clients.

“I think primarily because in the external environment, there are a couple of things which have happened. The winter in Europe was a little moderate and we heard some leaders talk about what they expected, what really happened — which is slightly better. Even China opening up a little bit and the huge travel that's happening, all of this is going to be good for the economy. I'm a little more optimistic than I was at the end of December,” he said.

In terms of sectors, CVK said that HCLTech is seeing significant consolidation opportunities in financial services.

Hiring

Net employee addition by IT companies saw a significant decline in the third quarter, and was down 93 percent from last quarter, believed to be an indicator of slowing growth in the IT services sector. However, CVK says that the hiring must be seen for the last 12 months, during which time the company added 30,000 freshers.

“It's true that we built up a little more capacity during the pandemic because there was a lot of demand and some of them are getting trained and getting deployed. So, you will see some moderation in the headcount numbers,” he said,

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However, he added that the company added close to 3,000 people during the quarter and are hiring 6,000-plus freshers in Q4.

“We continue to hire and in the next 12 months, we will hire another 30,000 freshers. That plan is still intact,” he said.