At a time when large IT companies saw their net employee headcount decline, many midcap IT companies are hiring and have added to their headcount in the second quarter of this fiscal. Even on year-on-year (y-o-y) basis, many midcaps have left large caps behind in headcount addition.
While some of the large IT companies saw headcount drop of about 5-6% in the last four quarters, couple of midcaps on the contrary grew their headcounts in higher single digits in the same period. For instance, Tata Elxsi, whose headcount rose by 10% over the last one year from the base of 11,679 in the September quarter of FY23. In June quarter of this fiscal, its headcount was 12,286. The company added 585 employees in its headcount in the second quarter of this fiscal, taking the total to 12,871 employees.
Happiest Minds’ headcount grew by 15% in the same four quarters. The company had 4,581 employees in the September quarter of FY23. In the last quarter, it added 237 employees to close the headcount number at 5,285 at the end of the second quarter.
Coforge’s headcount grew 7.1% over the last one year. Its global headcount is at 24,638 as of September 30, 2023. It saw a net addition of 414 people in the just-concluded quarter.
Sudhir Singh, CEO, Coforge, said, “Any firm that is growing and believes it will grow in the future will continue to hire as we have from the beginning of the year. Our hiring has been going on very strongly in the first half of this current fiscal. Our net headcount has gone up by 6%. That’s a very significant jump.”
LTTS’ headcount went up from 23,392 employees to 23,880 employees in the second quarter of this fiscal, up by 488. Even on year-on-year basis, the company’s headcount increased by 7.2%.
Cyient DET employee headcount increased by 3% over the last one year to reach 15,441 at the close of second quarter. In the June quarter, its headcount was 15,306.
Peter Bendor-Samuel, CEO, Everest group, said, “There are two big reasons for midcaps adding to their headcount. The first is that the smaller firms did not over hire to the same degree in the post-covid boom of the last 3 years, and hence have their employee to revenue more in balance than the larger firms, which did accelerate hiring well beyond their needs banking on continued growth.”
Peter added, “The second driver is that these smaller firms have different expectations on what demand is likely to look like over the next 6-9 months. They are not seeing the same drop off in discretionary spend as their larger cousins and have a more optimistic view of what the next 6-9 months is likely to bring.”