A number of factors including rising protectionist tendencies among governments,rising cost for exporting Indian workers,the availability of talent and the need to be identified as truly global companies is seeing major Indian IT firms turn to local talent in the 40 plus countries where they have operations. The president of the National Association of Software and Services Companies (Nasscom) Som Mittal calls it the development of Indian multinational IT companies. Signs of the push to hire locals in countries where Indian IT companies operate have been around for a while but there are renewed fears now that countries could resort to protectionism in the recession-hit global business environment. US president Barack Obamas rhetoric on taking jobs back from Bangalore to Buffalo is among the recent warning signs. Theres a strong push to hire and deploy locally where competitive local talent is available. We will globalise the spread and localise the talent, Wipro Limiteds chairman Azim Premji had said in April at the announcement of the 2008-09 results. Infosys Technologies Ltd,which hired as many as 300 students from foreign campuses in 2006,has announced the start of selective recruitment at campuses in the US,UK,Australia and China, in its 2008-09 annual report. The company currently has people from 76 nationalities spread across its 54 global development centres. Both Wipro and Infosys have a current foreign representation of five per cent on a total employee base of 97,810 and 1,04,850 respectively and are looking at foreign representation up to 15 per cent in the next three years. Tata Consultancy Services already has 11,484 foreign national employees making up nearly nine per cent of its total workforce a jump of over 3,200 foreign employees from the 2007 figure for the company. TCS has in its annual report for 2008-09 stated that the company is refining its business model to hire foreign nationals to overcome protectionist moves in other countries. Indian companies are creating more jobs locally. Protectionist rhetoric will always be around. Discussions have been held with governments like in the US to show what value Indian companies add to the local economies. They serve both economies, says Nasscom president Som Mittal. It is no longer about cost arbitrage alone. It is about expertise. Hiring local talent also allows Indian companies to get closer to the customers customers, says Pramod Bhasin,Nasscom chairman as well as president and CEO of Genpact,an IT enabled services company with a presence in 14 countries.
