The economic slowdown may have raised the spectre of job losses in most industries, but telecom is a notable exception. Far from cutting back, telecom companies expect to hire over 16,000 people, 15 to 20 per cent more than last year, to meet the unprecedented expansion in subscriber numbers, according to the Cellular Operators Association of India, the association for GSM service providers.
The entry of new players and the launch of third-generation, or 3G, services are also expected to expand demand for people.
India is one of the world's fastest-growing telecom markets, adding over 10 million subscribers in October, most of it for private mobile services. In the next 12 months or so, telecom operators expect to add at least 120 million customers and hope to more than double the subscriber base to 750 million by 2012 (against 300 million currently).
Besides, at least four new operators --Swan Telecom, Shyam-Sistema, Unitech-Telenor and Datacom--that have received operating licences this year are getting ready to roll out their networks in the next one year.
Reliance Communications and Tata Teleservices, the two leading providers of CDMA technology services, will also be rolling out all-India GSM operations by the second half of next year. GSM services account for over 75 per cent of mobile services in India.
Together, the six companies will spend between $8 billion and $10 billion to launch their services.
Meanwhile, incumbent players are also expanding. Vodafone-Essar, the country's third largest private telecom player with 57 million subscribers, recently launched services in five new circles and will do so in two more in a few months. Bharti, India's largest mobile services player, is focussing on rural market expansion apart from strengthening its presence in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh. And Aircel, promoted by Malaysia's Maxis Communications, will soon launch in seven of the 13 circles for which it has licences.
"With new players rolling out, expansion plans of current players and the huge growth in the number of subscribers, we will see a large growth in new recruitment. Also, look at the large indirect employment that it will generate," said Bharti Group Chairman Sunil Mittal.
Definitive figures are hard to come by but industry estimates that private telecom service providers employ 70,000 to 100,000 people.
For the industry as a whole, however, the hiring could be as high as 50,000 if expanded job requirements in related fields are considered. These include hiring fresh engineers by equipment manufacturers, mobile handset companies, outsourced network operators, and personnel for call centres, customer service and outsourced retail stores.
Despite the demand for people, salaries are unlikely to be astronomical because of the easy availability of talent in the market owing to the hiring slowdown elsewhere.
"What we are seeing is a softening of salaries. Also, there is more talent available, especially in the services area," said Sandip Das, CEO of Maxis Communications . The exception, he added, is when it comes to hiring telecom engineers.
An industry analyst said new offers are being made at salaries 10 to 15 per cent lower than last year.
Mahendra Nahata, director of new operator Datacom Solutions, said, new players are typically hiring at least 2,000 employees for start-up roll-outs.
A senior executive of Shyam Sistema, which has an all-India licence to launch CDMA services, confirmed this, adding: "By the end of 2009, we should have between 2,000 and 5,000 people on our rolls, depending on how much we outsource."
Telecom equipment manufacturers like Huawei have also stepped up hiring to meet growing business needs. With new orders rolling in, the company expects its order books to go up from $1 billion currently to $1.5 billion by the end of 2009, with a market share of 20 to 25 per cent.
"Our business is shifting towards managed services. Therefore, telecom companies not only buy equipment from us but we also manage operations for them," said CEO Max Young.
"To achieve these levels, we plan to hire more than 1,000 engineers over the next year to add to our current employee strength of around 1,500," he added.
