Indian Startups Compete With Bigger Firms For Campus Recruits

MUMBAI: Flush with funds and hungry for growth, a bunch of startups is gearing up to stake claim on talent at India’s top campuses.

As placements unfold over the next few months at the IITs, IIMs and other institutes, these startups look on track to give traditional heavyweights a run for their money in the battle for talent.

Ten startups that ET spoke to are collectively looking to hire more than 850 graduates across leading business schools, engineering colleges and graduate schools this fiscal.

From established names such as Flipkart, TaxiForSure and Olacabs to campus newbies like Vizury and CodeNation, almost all are hiring in greater numbers than before, armed with attractive pay packages and the promise of greater responsibilities and faster growth for potential hires.

Barely six months after being registered as a company, enterprise software developer CodeNation is already one of the most coveted recruiters at engineering campuses such as National Institutes of Technology (NITs), offering salaries of Rs 24 lakh. One of the last to go to the campuses last season, it hired 12 engineering graduates in March 2014.

This time, it plans to net the best early on from the IITs, NITs, IIITs (Indian Institutes of Information Technology), DTU (Delhi Technological University) and PESIT (PES Institute of Technology). "We went to campuses very late (last time), but do not want to do the same this time. We plan to hire 50 students from the best colleges," said Anuja Sivaram, head of operations at CodeNation.

Another relatively new name is Bangalore-based big data analytics startup Vizury. Last year, it went to two BITS Pilani University campuses with seven offers. The startup, which in June saw a third round of funding totaling $16 million from new and existing investors, is planning to recruit more this year. "We plan to hire 25-30 engineers from IITs, BITS Pilani University, NITs and IIIT campuses for our product engineering team. Students will be working on cuttingedge analytics and advertising technology platforms," said Subra Krishnan, vice-president in charge of products.

Taxi-service startup Olacabs, fresh after raising Rs 250 crore last month, is on an expansion mode.

To drive its growth plans, the company is in the market for 100 new hires from IITs and IIMs, compared with 40 it recruited last year, said co-founder and Chief Executive Bhavish Aggarwal.

Rival TaxiForSure, on its part, is heading to engineering campuses for the first time this year. Until now the company hired engineers laterally. "We will head to IIT-Madras and IIT-Bombay for the first time. Now we have five engineering managers who can train the new recruits and therefore there is sufficient leadership to hire from engineering campuses," said human resources head TN Hari.

While it hasn’t decided on the number of engineering students to be recruited, the startup will hire 25 from IIMs in Bangalore, Kolkata, Ahmedabad and Lucknow as well as the Indian School of Business.

Online retailer Flipkart, last year’s biggest recruiter in the startup space, declined to share numbers for this year but is expected to at least match last year’s hiring tally.
The Bangalore-based company, which made an entry into the ET Top Recruiters at B-schools survey for the first time this year, hired more than 275 students from across campuses, including 90 management trainees, 115 graduate trainees and 70 software development engineers last season.


What helps these startups attract talent other than strong hiring numbers is a vibrant work environment, and salaries that are as competitive as many established organisations. TaxiForSure, for instance, will be offering packages ofRs 8-10 lakh at IITs. At IIMs, salaries will range between Rs 12 lakh and Rs 25 lakh, compared with Rs 12-18 lakh last year.

Mobile marketing and communications startup ZipDial, which intends to hire around 20 students this year, says while its fixed salaries may be slightly lower than market rates, top performers stand to make much more in terms of variable bonuses and employee equity grants. LimeRoad.com, which operates an online shopping platform for women, will offer employee stock option programmes.

Restaurant-guide startup Zomato is offering around Rs 15 lakh a year while property listings portal Housing.com will be shelling out anywhere between Rs 12 lakh and Rs 18 lakh.

Mumbai-based Housing.com, which raised Rs 115 crore in a new round of funding in June, was in fact, a first-day recruiter at IITKharagpur placement rounds last December, sharing space with the likes of Google and Oracle.

This year, as well, several startups are likely to be among the first and second day recruiters at prestigious campuses, a privilege usually reserved for big-ticket recruiters.

"The culture of entrepreneurship that startups provide, the growth opportunities and the challenging work environment are all very attractive to a number of students," said Punj Rajan, a student placement committee member at IIT-Kharagpur. "They actually want several startups to be among the companies slotted in the first few days of placements." Rajan had interned with Jabong.com during summer. Even B-schools are ready to make extra efforts to attract more startups.

IIM-Bangalore last year organised a separate day for startups to come and hire from the executive MBA batch. "Startups often offer senior positions and if they need more time and rounds, we are ready to stretch for them. In the near future, we may have separate startup fairs for our flagship PGP batch too," said Sapna Agarwal, head of career development services at IIM-Bangalore.

Not surprisingly, Advitiya Sharma, co-founder of Housing.com, says he has been flooded by invitations from top colleges. His plans are not firmed up as yet, but he intends to hire around 25 people from IITs and a similar number from IIMs across software, analytics, operations and tech roles.

Another startup, Wooqer, has already made three pre-placement offers at Malaviya National Institute of Technology, Jaipur. It plans to hire 25 students across IITs and a couple of NITs, and intends to reach out to IIM-Indore, IIM-Bangalore, SP Jain Institute of Management & Research and NMIMS soon.

Salaries will range from Rs 13 lakh toRs 17 lakh. Other institutes including graduate and design schools are also being targeted by these startups.

Upasana Nath, chief recruitment officer at Zomato, said besides the 40 students it will be hiring from engineering colleges like the IITs and senior leadership profiles from IIMs and ISB, it will be taking on board 200 for front line sales and content operations from graduate colleges in Delhi, Mumbai and Bangalore. Suchi Mukherjee, CEO & co-founder of LimeRoad.com, said the startup intends to get 30-50 people from campuses alone. IITs in Delhi, Kanpur, Mumbai and Chennai will be the focus for technology and IIMs in Ahmedabad, Bangalore and Kolkata for product managers, marketing and category managers.