Infosys and Wipro, which reported their July-September earnings on Thursday, saw their headcount improving on a sequential basis but the same lower than the same period last year. IT companies have been struggling with a slowdown in tech spending over the last two years, during which some of them had to halt fresher intake and rationalise headcount.
During the September quarter, Infosys reported an increase in its net headcount – a first in the last seven quarters. The headcount rose by 2,446 to 317,778, up from 315,332 in the June quarter. Meanwhile, on a year-on-year basis the headcount was down by 10,986.
Wipro’s headcount declined by 10,818 employees over the same period last year to 233,889 employees during the September quarter. But on a sequential basis, headcount improved by 978 employees.
Meanwhile, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), which came out with its earnings on October 10, added 5,726 employees, while HCLTech saw a decline of 780 employees during the September quarter.
On the hiring front, Infosys said it plans to hire between 15,000 to 20,000 freshers in fiscal year 2025, while Wipro said it plans to onboard between 2,500-3,000 freshers every quarter this fiscal.
Infosys had hired 11,900 in the fiscal year 2024, which is a significant drop from the over 50,000 freshers the company recruited the previous year.
Wipro’s management also said that they will clear the backlog of offers the company had handed out earlier, by the end of the December quarter. “We are very clearly looking at gearing ourselves for future demand, and there are specific areas where we have invested in, so that we are ready when demand comes,” the management said during the earnings conference.
While attrition at Infosys increased sequentially in the September quarter by 20 bps to 12.9%, it improved over the 14.6% during the same period last year. Similarly at Wipro, attrition improved to 14.5% from 15.5% a year ago, while sequentially it increased by 40 bps.
Meanwhile, Infosys’s net utilisation rose 40 bps sequentially to 84.3% in the September quarter, and meaningfully over the 80.4% in the year-ago quarter. Wipro’s net utilisation rose to 86.4% from 84.5% a year ago but fell 130 bps sequentially.