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Firm to prune domestic costs through initiatives such as voluntary separation Cognizant Technology Solutions plans to sharply increase local hiring in the US this year with increased demand for co-innovation and on-site presence from clients. The Nasdaq-listed technology services major said it would look at talent across local community colleges to big management universities to man different projects in the US. Last month, when the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services opened the window for applications,   Cognizant   applied for "less than half" H1B visas compared with last year. "We are evolving our workforce and delivery in the United States. Cognizant hired 4,000 US citizens in 2016, and in 2017 and beyond, we expect to significantly ramp up our US based workforce by hiring experienced professionals in the open market and by making more use of university programmes. We are shifting our workforce largely in response to clients' increasing n...

Even if there were no Brexit or US Elections, hiring by IT firms would have been the same Fresh graduates out of engineering colleges may find getting a job tougher at large IT services firms this year as India's IT industry struggles with new business models. Technology services firms have traditionally hired thousands of fresh engineering graduates and trained them to build capacity to handle projects of their global clients. Now most of these entry level jobs can be automated, forcing   IT firms   to reduce their campus hiring. So Indian information technology (IT) services firms are likely to hire 40 per cent fewer engineering graduates this year. Tech firms have been witnessing a dip in traditional software services and maintenance business, which earns them a major chunk of revenue, as clients are demanding services on digital technology and cloud. This is freeing up people from repetitive tasks such as testing and low-end maintenance. Infotech companies such...