Big ticket recruiters Microsoft, Oracle, Uber shower up to Rs 1.2 crore annual salary packages on IITians as placements get rolling

At IIT-Bombay, the first day was dominated by companies from the engineering and financial sector. Most of the companies offered base salaries to the tune of Rs 14-15 lakh, in addition to joining bonuses and other benefits. 18 companies, including Google, Microsoft, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, Boston Consulting, Bain, WorldQuant, A T Kearney, P&G and ITC, spent the day hunting for talent. Microsoft and financial services firms, Blackstone and Goldman Sachs offered some of the highest salary packages during the first slot on the first day of placements. While Microsoft selected five candidates and offered jobs based in the US as well as within the country, Goldman Sachs picked up 7 students and Blackstone hired two students. Millennium Hedge Fund, with its big money, also picked two candidates. Sources confirmed that the pay packages offered for the US-based job profiles ranged between Rs 70-80 lakh a year, but it’s not clear if the amount was only the base salary. The ITC group, which is said to have selected three students, offered a package of Rs 17 lakh and Rs 2 lakh as joining bonus. Other notable companies to offer jobs during the first slot include Google, public sector company Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) and Procter and Gamble (P&G), which made one, six and three offers, respectively.

It was a happy time for IIT Guwahati and Roorkee students as they are among those who have got eight-digit packages. At Guwahati, Oracle and Microsoft made the highest international offers of $136000 (Rs 93 lakh roughly) and $135,000 (Rs 92 lakh). While Microsoft India has offered such packages both at IIT Roorkee and Guwahati, Oracle India has offered this package only at Guwahati. These include base pay, relocation allowance and joining bonus. Including employee stock option, the top offer would be about Rs1.2 crore, said IIT sources. The highest domestic offer came from Tower Research, a first-timer on the Guwahati campus, which offered Rs 36 lakh package.

Uber is believed to have offered foreign postings at Kharagpur, while NTT Communications also picked up students from the institute. IIT-K also allowed ONGC and Isro to hire on day one.

At IIT-Madras, 57 offers were made at the end of two sessions on Day One. Among these were three international offers from Microsoft, Oracle and Uber International made during the graveyard shift from midnight until 6am on Thursday. Uber International was the big buyer with its massive annual compensation of $1.1 lakh or around Rs 75 lakh (base salary). The morning at IIT-Madras saw participation from other companies such as Samsung R&D Bangalore, Goldman Sachs, IBM Research, Texas Instruments, Boston Consulting Group, Dalberg Global Development Advisers, Nutanix Technologies, Auctus Advisors, Xerox Research Centre, VISA Inc and ITC Ltd. The companies that made more than four offers at IIT-M included Microsoft, Samsung R&D, Goldman Sachs, Oracle, VISA and ITC.

Meanwhile, Samsung, which took the pre-placement offer (PPO) route stole the show around IITs by picking around 10 students, including five from IIT-Bombay and a couple from IIT-Delhi and IIT-Kanpur, and offering them the largest compensation of $1.15 lakh (Rs 78 lakh) as base salary. The first phase of the placements will end on December 13. The next phase will continue from January to April 2017. Though it’s early, IITs said they are hopeful the average salary package this time will see a growth between 10-12%.