Everyone is talking about Artificial Intelligence — the new normal, which has entered almost every work process across industries. Enterprises are rethinking and strengthening their AI capabilities, using it as a tool to improve products and services. With AI becoming crucial to enterprise success, upskilling has become the new mantra among Indian IT professionals, who are keen to make an impact in their careers with Machine Learning and AI.

In our annual AI Study with Great Learning, we take a look at key AI trends dominating the Indian AI market-leading companies, professionals, salaries, jobs broken down by cities and how AI’s potential for industry growth has risen over the last few years. In the second half of the study, we cover AI literacy in India through Great Learning’s comprehensive AI/ML programs that are bridging the current skill gap and consequently boosting workforce transitions.

Key Trends

• The Artificial Intelligence Industry in India is currently estimated to be $230 million (annual) in revenue, up from $180M a year ago
• Currently, there are approximately 40,000 AI professionals in India
• There is a growing interest in AI with the Indian government doubling up spends on AI/ML research
• AI applications have emerged in key areas like healthcare and agriculture
• Bengaluru outpaces its peers in terms of attracting AI talent and has emerged as a leading AI hub in India

AI Professionals in India

• The average work experience of AI professionals in India is 6.6 years, same as last year
• Around 3,700 freshers were added to the AI workforce in India this year
• Almost 55% AI professionals in India have a work experience of fewer than 5 years, same as last year
• 23% of AI professionals have more than 10 years of work experience. This work experience is not necessarily in AI but these professionals have transitioned into AI over time
• Women participation in AI workforce remains low – only 24% of AI professionals in India are women

Tenure

• On average, AI professionals in India have joined/transitioned to their current role in the last 3 years
• 67% AI professionals in India have joined/transitioned to their current role in the last 2 years
• The numbers reveal AI is a relatively emerging technology and a large number of professionals are gradually gravitating toward it

Education

• 48% of AI professionals have a Master’s/Post Graduation degree
• 5% of AI professionals in India hold a Ph.D. or a Doctorate degree

AI Companies in India

• The 10 companies that employ the most AI professionals in India are Accenture, TCS, Cognizant, Infosys, Wipro, IBM, Microsoft, Amazon, Capgemini & HCL Technologies
• More than 1,000 companies in India claim to work on AI in some form. This includes a small number of companies into products (chatbots, AI-powered visual search and recommendation engine) and a larger chunk offering either offshore, recruitment or training services
• There is an increase of almost 30% year-over-year in the number of companies setting up dedicated AI teams in India
• Moreover, the number of vertical AI companies in India are still very few in number, compared to the strength of AI companies around the globe. Even in analytics, India accounts for just 8% of global Analytics companies

Company Size

• On average, Indian AI companies have 87 employees on their payroll
• Almost 85% of Analytics companies in India have less than 50 employees

AI Talent Divide Across Companies 

• Almost 37% of AI professionals in India are employed with large-sized companies(with a total employee base of 10k+)
• Mid-size organizations (total employee base in the range of 200-10K) employ 29% of all AI professionals in India.
• Startups (less than 200 employee base) employees form 34% of AI professionals in India.
• A large percentage of AI professionals are absorbed by digitally mature big tech firms that are increasing their investment in AI in India.
• This is also a clear indication of the AI talent divide between enterprises and startups in India, which will only continue to widen further

Cities

• Bengaluru leads the cities in terms of the size of the AI ecosystem. 32% of AI professionals in India are working in Bengaluru
• This is closely followed by Delhi NCR at 22%

AI Salaries in India

• The median AI salary in India is INR 14.3 Lakhs across all experience level and skill sets.
• Around 40% of AI professionals in India have an entry-level salary of 6 Lakh onwards
• Almost 4% of AI professionals in India command a salary higher than 50 Lakhs

Average Salary Trend Across Cities

• Mumbai is the highest paymaster in AI at almost 15.6 Lakhs per annum, followed by Bengaluru at 14.5 Lakhs
• Chennai is the lowest paymaster at 10.4 Lakhs

AI Jobs in India

• While it is difficult to ascertain the exact number of open AI job openings, according to our estimates, close to 4,000 positions related to AI are currently available to be filled in India. Open AI jobs is a different metric than new jobs advertised per month
• Compared to worldwide estimates, India contributes 10% of open job openings currently. Growth in the number of AI jobs globally was much higher than in India
• 10 leading organizations with the most number of AI openings this year are – IBM, Accenture, Amazon, Fractal Analytics, Societe Generale, SAP Labs, 24/ 7 Customer, Atos, Nvidia & Tech Mahindra
• The top skill sets that AI employers are looking for are Machine Learning, Natural Language Processing, Neural Networks, Analytics, Cloud Computing & Pattern Recognition
• Almost 92% of AI jobs advertised in India are for full-time roles; rest are part-time, internships or contract basis jobs

AI Jobs By Cities

• In terms of cities, Bengaluru accounts for around 33% of AI jobs in India. This is down from 37% last year
• Delhi/NCR comes second contributing 30% AI jobs in India. This is up from 23% last year
• Approximately 12% of AI jobs are from Mumbai, almost the same as last year

Experience Requirement By AI Jobs

• Around 43% of AI jobs are looking for candidates with less than 5 years of experience
• 6% AI jobs are for freshers
• 57% AI job openings are for professionals with more than 5 years of job experience

Here’s the complete Report:

Download The report

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