AI slows hiring at India’s GCCs as headcount per center stalls
- India had 2,117 GCCs after 400+ opened in the two years to March 2026.
- GCC headcount rose 24% to more than 2.36 million, per Zinnov.
- Workers per GCC are roughly 1,115 this year, down from 1,130 in 2024.
- Zinnov puts 55% of GCC work under AI displacement pressure.
BENGALURU, INDIA — Multinationals’ global capability centers (GCCs) in India, a major source of tech jobs as domestic software firms cut back, are turning cautious on hiring as artificial intelligence (AI) pushes companies to rethink large workforces. The number of centers keeps rising, but the average team at each one has stopped growing.
More centers, flatter teams
More than 400 GCCs were set up in India in the two years to March 2026, taking the total to 2,117, according to Zinnov estimates cited by Nikkei Asia. Employee count rose 24% to more than 2.36 million.
Workers per GCC grew to 1,130 in 2024 from about 910 in 2019, but the figure is roughly 1,115 this year. Visa, Technicolour, PayPal and Fidelity have each cut hundreds of positions at their Indian centers.
“Our whole industry was based on how many people we could hire because work output was directly proportional to the number of people,” said Lalit Ahuja, chief executive at ANSR, which helps companies build GCCs. He said “the newer GCCs and even the incumbents are rationalizing headcount.”
Work in AI’s path
Zinnov classifies nearly 18% of GCC work as commodity tasks such as software testing and 37% as procedural work such as software development, implying 55% of GCC portfolios are under displacement pressure. Praveen Bhadada, chief executive at consultancy Neovay, estimates about 25 GCCs in India closed or were sold in the fiscal year that ended in March, a number he expects to double this year.
Some centers are changing hands. Tata Consultancy Services recently took over American retailer Best Buy’s India GCC, following HCLTech‘s acquisition of Guardian Life’s GCC in August. Bhadada said AI could “seriously come after commodity jobs that are in India.”
Rivals, and a bet on new entrants
India hosts nearly 40% of the world’s GCCs, according to UnearthIQ, but Poland, Hungary, Romania, Brazil and Mexico are competing for the work. European sites help with General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) compliance, while Mexico and Costa Rica share business hours with the United States.
UnearthIQ chief executive Gaurav Vasu said struggling GCCs are more likely to transform than close. “The future will be led by small and midsize GCCs built around AI-native applications,” he said.
Ahuja expects new entrants such as McDonald’s and Starbucks, and expansions by Sanofi and JP Morgan, to help offset the reduction in headcount.
For companies running or planning a global capability center (GCC) in India, the data point to smaller, AI-skilled teams rather than headcount growth. Firms comparing a captive center with a provider-run global delivery center can start with the top AI outsourcing companies list.
Related news
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- Starbucks to open first India GCC in Chennai, creating 800 jobs · 26 Sep
- IT firms cut jobs while India’s GCCs expand · 18 Sep
Disclosure: Outsource Accelerator uses AI tools in the backend of its editorial workflow. Every article is reviewed and verified by a human editor before publication.
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