Automation killed a quarter of new IT jobs in 2015

The reduction in hiring indicates a shift in the business model from hiring thousands of people to write code cheap to using artificial intelligence for repeatable tasks.

The country's top five information technology companies reduced their hiring by almost a fourth to 77,365 people in 2015 as they aggressively pursued automation, according to brokerage firm Centrum Broking.

In the October-December period alone, the combined net additions of employees at TCS, Infosys, Wipro, HCL Technologies and Cognizant were 28,182, down 38 per cent from the same period a year ago.

The reduction in hiring indicates a shift in the business model from hiring thousands of people to write code cheap to using artificial intelligence for repeatable tasks.

The report says the least number of job additions in 2015 were at Cognizant and HCL Technologies, while freeing of resources was more pronounced at Infosys and Wipro.

"Vendors are focusing on automation and 2015-16 will be an inflection point. We see rapid scope for vendors expanding automation owing to competitive pressure," says the report.