HCL Technologies is planning to hire up to 9,000 freshers during Oct 2020 -March 2021

ITeS major HCL Technologies NSE -3.82 % today said it is looking at hiring up to 9,000 freshers in the second half of this fiscal on the back of strong growth momentum.

The company is implementing the salary increments effective October 1, up to E3 levels, and effective January 1, for E4 and above levels, it was announced.

The appraisals, which were deferred amid Covid uncertainty, will be similar to the previous year, the company announced. Last year, the company had offered a an average 6 per cent raise to its staff in India and 2.5 per cent increase in wages of overseas employees.

At the end of September 2020 quarter, HCL had 153,085 employees, while attrition for IT services (on a last 12 month basis) was at 12.2 per cent.

As for hiring plans, Chief Human Resources Officer Apparao V said the company onboarded over 1,500 freshers in the September quarter.

According to its earnings numbers released today, the Noida-based company posted 18.5 per cent rise in September quarter net profit at Rs 3,142 crore.

The company’s deal pipeline rose 20 per cent QoQ, which is “an all-time high”, it said.

In September, HCL Technologies had announced the acquisition of Australian IT firm DWS Ltd for USD 115.8 million.

The company will increase investments in certain geographies like Germany, France, Australia, Japan and Canada, said President and CEO C Vijayakumar.

On the recently announced restrictions on the H-1B non-immigrant visa programme in the US, Vijayakumar said about two-thirds of its employees are locals.

“The current regulations definitely require the wages to be increased significantly when their visas come for renewal. So, it will have an impact on cost. However, in FY21, we don’t see an impact, there are two quarters more to go and there’ll be a limited impact this year. But it can have some impact in the next year. We will quantify that as we plan for the next year,” he said.