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Raja Simhan T.E.

Chennai , Dec. 14

THE IT sector in India is booming and there is intense competition among companies in hiring quality people, be it from campuses or the market.

With ESOPs (employee stock options) losing charm among IT professionals, Indian firms were paying higher salaries to attract and retain talent, an industry source said.

The current salary level in the industry is higher than that during the IT boom of 1999-2000.

During the dull market period a couple of years ago, some of the firms had an appraisal every 18 months. The frequency has been reduced to 12 months.

Further, the increased intake of professionals, mainly experienced, by global giants like Accenture and EDS in India had forced Indian firms to pay more to their existing employees, the source said.

Meanwhile, a survey of the top IT firms shows that staff cost has increased significantly for most of the firms, except Ramco Systems, during September quarter 2003 when compared with figures a year back.

The companies have also ramped up their employee strength considerably during the quarter.

Infosys added 2,025 employees. Its staff cost shot up to Rs 567.25 crore compared to Rs 399.89 crore a year back and Rs 537 crore in the June 2003 quarter.

Similarly, Satyam Computer added 658 employees during the quarter under review. Its staff cost increased to Rs 304.03 crore compared to Rs 242.39 crore a year back and Rs 277.37 crore during the previous quarter.

For HCL Technologies, staff cost increased to Rs 88.2 crore (Rs 56.1 crore) from Rs 71.6 crore during the quarter ended June.

Wipro Technologies added 3,091 people. Of this, 1,061 were in IT services and 2,030 in IT-enabled services.

For Polaris Software, the net addition in staff between June and September was less at 55.

However, the company's staff cost during September 2003 quarter more than doubled to Rs 73.35 crore when compared to the September 2002 quarter.

The increased staff cost was due to the change in a customer-billing model for services rendered onsite from the earlier cost plus model - wherein the associates working onsite were being billed on actual basis plus the offshore rates - said a Polaris official.

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