Indian IT Needs New Model: HCL CEO on AI Disruption

Mumbai, Feb 24 (PTI) The time is up for the over three-decades-old business model with the advent of artificial intelligence, HCL Technologies' chief executive C Vijayakumar said on Monday.

Speaking at industry lobby grouping Nasscom's annual NTLF event here, Vijayakumar said companies need to be "paranoid", given the wide-ranging impact of AI and stressed that this attitude will help them to be relevant and grow.

"I strongly believe that the business model is ripe for disruption. What we saw in the last 30 years was a fairly linear scaling of revenues and people. I think time is already up for that (business model)," he said.

Over the last two years, HCL has been challenging employees to do twice the amount of work with half the workforce, he said, pointing out that AI-driven automation needs to be used more.

"You need to be more paranoid about the level of impact it (AI) can have, and I think, if you approach it with that paranoia...we will all come out winners in the long term," he added.

Bigger rival Infosys' CEO and MD Salil Parekh also concurred with Vijayakumar and pointed out that the industry needs to be paranoid to be relevant.

"A large part of the industry is driven by input-based model. People are delivering certain outcomes. We need to dramatically change to output. A lot of services we deliver need to become platform-based from people-based," Vijayakumar said, warning that growth in revenues should not make a company complacent.

He also suggested that Indian tech firms develop their large language models.

Meanwhile, Parekh said Infosys is on the lookout for a big-sized acquisition to boost its capabilities, while Vijayakumar stressed that size does not hold a lot of significance for HCL.