Emerging cities may witness a boom in tech hiring: ISF

Indian Staffing Federation (ISF), an apex body representing manpower outsourcing industry in the country, indicated that emerging cities including Ahmedabad, Coimbatore, Visakhapatnam, Surat, Kochi, and Nagpur were becoming key growth hubs and would witness a boom in tech hiring.

According to a report ISF released on Thursday, India is the second-largest player in the South Asia-Pacific (APAC) region within the rapidly expanding APAC IT staffing market. The Indian IT Flexi staffing market size was $4.9 billion in FY24 and is expected to grow at a CAGR of 7% from FY24 to FY26.

ISF President, Lohit Bhatia said, the country’s IT-flexi staffing market had a workforce of 597,000. GCCs (global capability centres of MNCs) demonstrated a higher penetration rate in IT Flexi Staffing at 8.2%compared to traditional IT/ITeS firms while IT/ITeS and GCC collectively accounted for half (49%) of the market total market, he added.

Gender-wise share in flexi hiring

ISF observed that Delhi/NCR led in women’s workforce participation, followed by Karnataka, Maharashtra, Telangana, and Tamil Nadu.

States with a strong IT infrastructure and inclusive policies saw higher female participation in tech workforce. Conversely, male dominance persisted in states with traditionally male-dominated sectors such as manufacturing and engineering. The IT female labour workforce participation rate is averaging at 37%, it found.