Indians Moving Up In Global IT Salary Chain

Though there is certain cost efficiency in Indian operations, but as you hire more senior professionals, the cost difference narrows. So, it is primarily about great talent. We don’t look at India as a way to save cost. We look at attracting more talent - Dan Schiappa, Chief Product and Services Officer, Arctic Wolf, tells Bizz Buzz

Bengaluru: The salary gap between Indian engineers in senior roles as compared to their global counterparts is shrinking very fast as the country emerges as one of the talent hubs in emerging technologies like artificial intelligence.

According to leaders in the GCC (Global Capability Centres) space, global firms are setting up technology captives or GCCs in India for the top talent availability than for cost advantage.

They also opined that competition for good AI talent among well-funded startups, GCCs and IT services firms is pushing compensation of data scientists, AI engineers

“Though there is certain cost efficiency in Indian operations, but as you hire more senior professionals, the cost difference narrows. So, it is primarily about great talent. We don’t look at India as a way to save cost. We look at attracting more talent,” Dan Schiappa, Chief Product and Services Officer of global cyber security firm, Arctic Wolf told Bizz Buzz.

Arctic Wolf opened its R&D centre in Bengaluru last year and is expanding its presence in the country recently.

According to HR experts in the know, the cost of hiring senior professionals in India no longer has much cost differentials with respect to their global counterparts. This is especially true for emerging technologies like AI, data science & others.

Reports suggested that Indian AI startups are providing sound payout to AI engineers, which are comparable to their global counterparts. For instance, TurboML is offering Rs1 lakh to engineers at internship role. It is providing up to Rs80 lakh per year for full-time role.

Similarly, Smallest.ai is offering around Rs40 lakh per annum with notes like- ‘college-doesn’t matter’ to AI engineers.

Not only tech startups, these kinds of compensations are being offered by IT services firms and GCCs as AI-driven solutions & platforms are seen as the future of technology.

As the cost arbitrage play goes down, more technology firms and GCCs are looking at top notch tech talent to drive growth.

“Indian engineers in the junior level are paid less. But compensation drastically rises when they reach 5-7 years of experience. As opportunities for going abroad come down in recent years as part of onsite posting, Indian engineers are also looking at fair compensations, ESOPs and others for matching their global counterparts,” said a HR expert.