Indian IT companies are shifting their focus towards profitability rather than employment opportunities due to the disruptive impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on various industries, as highlighted by former HCL Technologies CEO Vineet Nayyar at the ‘AI Impact Summit 2026’. Nayyar emphasized that Indian companies, including those in the IT sector, are profit-oriented, indicating a reduced emphasis on job creation. He suggested that employment opportunities may stem from the proliferation of mass-scale startups, a strategy already being pursued by the government.
In the realm of AI competitiveness, India currently holds the third position globally, trailing behind the United States and China. Microsoft’s Chief of artificial intelligence, Mustafa Suleyman, recently cautioned that a significant number of white-collar roles reliant on computers could be automated within the next 12 to 18 months. Microsoft is actively developing a “professional-grade AGI” to automate tasks typically performed by professionals such as lawyers, accountants, project managers, and marketers.
The evolving AI landscape is expected to bring about substantial changes in knowledge-based professions, moving beyond mere productivity enhancements to structural transformations. Suleyman predicted that within the next 12 to 18 months, AI technology could fully automate tasks in white-collar professions like law, accounting, project management, and marketing. This automation trend is evident in the strategies of tech giants like Oracle, which plans to reduce its workforce by 20,000 to 30,000 employees to bolster its AI data center capabilities, and Amazon, which recently announced layoffs of 16,000 employees as part of its AI restructuring efforts.
The software industry, including Indian IT stocks, has witnessed significant turbulence as US-based AI firm Anthropic introduced an enterprise AI assistant with enhanced automation capabilities for complete business workflows. This development has sparked investor concerns about AI potentially displacing a substantial portion of the software business, leading to a notable sell-off referred to as the “SaaSpocalypse.” The new AI assistant boasts capabilities to automate various tasks such as legal document reviews, compliance checks, sales planning, marketing analysis, financial reconciliation, data visualization, SQL-based reporting, and enterprise-wide document searches.
