EPAM’s India employee strength to reach 10k by March'25, opens new innovation hub in Pune

U.S-based IT engineering services provider EPAM Systems which considers India as one of its key growth and talent markets, is on a hiring spree in the country. 

The company has hired over 2,000 employees in India this year alone, bringing its local workforce to more than 9,000, with plans to reach 10,000 by March 2025, Srinivas Reddy, Managing Director of EPAM told TechCircle on his recent visit to India.

Reddy explained that EPAM's India operations had 7,050 employees at the end of December last year, accounting for about 13% of the company's 53,000 global workforce across Central and Eastern Europe, Central and Western Asia, India, and Latin America.  

Over the next decade, EPAM's employee count in India is expected to grow nearly tenfold with the company looking at hiring prompt engineers, AI ambassadors, and AI consultants to serve its wide clientele on key transformation projects in the field of AI, analytics, cloud and digital engineering.

EPAM entered the Indian market by acquiring Alliance Global Services in 2015, which had around 1,000 employees in Hyderabad at the time. The company now operates centres in Bengaluru, Hyderabad, Chennai, Pune, and Gurugram. In this context Reddy also announced the opening of a new office in Baner, Pune, marking the company's third expansion in India this year, following Bengaluru and Chennai.

As EPAM's second-largest global delivery centre, India is vital to the company’s growth strategy, focusing on building a diverse talent pool. The new Pune office will serve as an innovation and Offshore Development Center (ODC) for EPAM's clients, leveraging the city's educational resources and skilled workforce.

Reddy also said that EPAM is experiencing substantial growth due to global capability centres (GCCs) in India, which are investing heavily in technology solutions, particularly in data and cloud computing. Reddy noted that approximately 50% of EPAM's Indian business comes from GCCs, where it works on advanced engineering and cloud-native projects across various industries, including banking, healthcare, retail, and manufacturing.

According to the latest Nasscom-Zinnov India GCC landscape report, the total number of GCCs set up in India has increased to 1,700 in the fiscal year 2024 ending March, generating $64.6 billion in export revenue. In total, these GCCs have employed over 1.9 million people. This growth presents significant opportunities for IT companies like EPAM, which assist GCCs in adopting AI and emerging technologies.

Reddy further mentioned that EPAM is leveraging AI and generative AI to enhance its product and engineering strategies, especially in the BFSI, retail, travel, and healthcare sectors. The company has trained 4,000 engineers in foundational AI skills with over 2,500 specializing in AI-integrated Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) and 1,000 currently engaged in innovative AI projects across its five facilities.

The India announcement comes only days after the engineering company said it has acquired First Derivative, a UK-based managed services provider and consulting business for the capital markets industry at an undisclosed amount to deliver AI-enabled capabilities to clients in banking, capital markets and other financially regulated businesses across North America, Europe and APAC.

The company, which operates on a January-December fiscal year, reported $1.17 billion in revenue for the September quarter, achieving a CAGR of 0.48% from December 31, 2021, to September 31, 2024.