For the deployment of their workforce in North America, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Infosys, HCLTech, Wipro, and Tech Mahindra now rely between 20 and less than 50 percent on H-1B visas.
Even though US President Donald Trump increased the visa price to $100,000 on September 20, leading Indian IT services businesses are gradually decreasing their dependency on H-1B visas.
For the deployment of their workforce in North America, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Infosys, HCLTech, Wipro, and Tech Mahindra now rely between 20 and less than 50 percent on H-1B visas.
US companies may recruit foreign labor in specialized industries like IT and STEM thanks to H-1B visas.
Additionally, between FY15 and FY23, the number of authorized H-1B applications for the top seven Indian IT companies fell by 56% to 6,700. In the US, companies like Infosys and TCS now have more than 50% local employees, which lessens the need for visas.
Big businesses have switched to subcontracting, offshore delivery, local staffing, and US delivery centers.
lowering the need for visas
Nearly half of TCS’s revenue comes from North America, and the company employs more than half of its US workers domestically. Earlier in January, Chief Executive Officer K Krithivasan told Moneycontrol that the biggest IT services business in India receives between 3,000 and 4,000 H-1B visas annually.
In the grand scope of things, it is a little number. In the event that H-1B availability declines, we may shift employment to India or provide compensation.
With more than 60% of its US staff now local, Infosys, TCS’ closest competitor, has also reduced its reliance on H-1B visas. Their on-site H-1B mix decreased from around 30 percent to 24 percent in FY25, according to CFO Jayesh Sanghrajka.
With over 80% of their US staff being local, HCLTech and Wipro have the lowest dependence (20%). Ramachandran Sundararajan, Chief People Officer of HCLTech, said, “We process little more than 500 to 1,000 H-1Bs a year.”
Earlier in January, Wipro CEO Srinivas Pallia said that the business has a robust H-1B inventory and is ready to satisfy US demand if necessary.
Only 30% of Tech Mahindra’s US employees are on H-1B visas, demonstrating the company’s minimal dependence. In January, CEO Mohit Joshi emphasized that the business has established sizable local teams and near-shore delivery facilities, reducing the entire dependency on visas to less than 30%.
Demand for visas is still high
The number of applications for H-1B visas is nevertheless increasing in spite of this decreased reliance.
According to USCIS statistics, applications increased by 3.1 percent, approvals increased by 4 percent, and rejections decreased by 32.5 percent in 2024 compared to 2023. The approval percentage reached 98.4 percent, the best since 2021, according to Kamal Karanth, co-founder of the hiring company Xpheno.
Global digital transformation, artificial intelligence, cloud computing, cybersecurity, and persistent STEM talent shortages in the US are the reasons for the need, according to Krishna Vij, business head-IT staffing at TeamLease Digital.
Greater impact on US Big Tech
Ironically, American IT heavyweights rather than Indian outsourcing companies are now the largest consumers of the H-1B program. The top five US companies together received around 28,000 approvals in FY24, while in FY2025, one e-commerce behemoth topped the list with 10,000 approvals.
Due to the ongoing talent scarcity in the US, these companies mostly employ H-1Bs for high-paying, specialized positions like data scientists and AI engineers.
According to Pareek Jain of EIIRTrend, Indian IT would see short-term interruption and margin erosion as a result of the $100,000 H-1B charge. The medium-term view indicates stabilization via offshore, nearshoring, GCCs, and AI adoption, even while alternatives like local employment and subcontracting still depend on H-1Bs. “Agile businesses should do better,” Jain wrote on X.