SAP Labs India looks to double AI talent base by 2024, upskilling existing workforce

Sindhu Gangadharan, MD, SAP Labs India

Enterprise application software giant SAP Labs India is looking to double its AI talent base in India by 2024 to meet the demand of an evolving business landscape, the company said. India, the company’s largest R&D centre with over 15,000 people, will be looking to double its AI talent base by way of hiring as well as upskilling those in the company’s workforce, India MD Sindhu Gangadharan told Moneycontrol.

“Doubling our AI investment translates into a combination of new hires, plus our current people reskilling themselves and getting abreast on the technologies which they are in the process of infusing into their lines of business,” she said.

While Gangadharan did not report on numbers, she said that the company has been involved with AI for a long time. While the company does have a dedicated team working on AI, the current doubling will happen across domains, she said.

“Sixty percent of our core R&D team in some way or the other is involved in AI today already,” she said.

Later this year, SAP said it plans to announce new solutions and capabilities across its portfolio that use AI.

The doubling of the workforce also comes when the company is constructing a second office in Bengaluru which the company had previously said will create 15,000 jobs.

Gangadharan, who was appointed as the vice-chair of industry body NASSCOM earlier this week also outlined her top priorities in the new role during the conversation.

“It's to keep that edge in terms of having the best in class talent when it comes to digital skills, cloud skills, AI skills, we [the country] have to continue to invest in that. The strong triangle between industry, government and academia needs to be taken forward with a lot more momentum forward so that we can really keep that number one position,” she said, outlining her first priority, as India looks to maintain its edge of having 16 percent of the world’s AI workforce.

Her other priorities would be to use technology to address challenges that the country is facing, and to take “make sure that we take the AI game to the next level”.

The software trade body also liaisons with the government, at a time when the government is looking at regulation of AI as well. The NASSCOM vice-chair called for necessary guardrails to use the technology in a responsible manner.

We need to have the right balance of making it accessible for whichever user needs it where the joy in the usage of the technology is not lost, but also strike a balance by doing it in a responsible manner, she said.