US visa hike: Party time for techies

Bangalore: The US Senate on Thursday approved a landmark Immigration Reform Bill that proposes to give citizenship to millions of illegal people and double the number of H1B visas.

The bill - that proposes an increase in H1B visas from a cap of 65,000 to 1,15,000, and a 20 per cent increase in subsequent years if the limit is crossed - has put the smile back on the Bangalore techies' face.

Tech giants like Microsoft and Intel had been pressurising Washington by threatening to move jobs abroad if it did not raise the cap on the visas. But it's the small IT firms that will reap maximum benefits from the move.

"I think it will impact everyone favourably. For the small firms, earlier it was a little more difficult. For large firms they used to take a blanket approach, but small firms suffered, as they were unable to predict their needs. Now it will make it a level playing field," says Chief Executive Officer, TVA Infotech, Gautam Sinha.

However, the decision may not affect large companies such as Wipro, Infosys, Hindustan Computers Limited (HCL) and Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) as they have already built large H1B visa banks.

Wipro has about 1,000 visa-ready professionals in India waiting for onsite assignments besides about 2,000 employees, already in the US.

Infosys is estimated to have about 7,000 H1B visas, of which only about half are used.

While most IT and BPO officials made no official comment, they said privately the Senate's decision was good for India. They are awaiting Congress' decision to read the fine print. But this decision takes many IT professionals in Bangalore one step closer to a dream job in the US.

(With inputs from Roshni Menon)

(For updates you can share with your friends, follow IBNLive on Facebook, Twitter and Google+)