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While the euphoria of businesses around the potential of artificial intelligence (AI) driving efficiency and reducing costs, the demand for professionals trained in AI and machine learning (ML) is rising fast in India, The Times of India has reported quoting Randstad, recruitment firm headquartered in the Netherlands.

Randstad has said there are about 2 lakh persons who have the requisite skills in artificial intelligence and machine learning in the country. Furthermore, the position for these professionals is galloping at 30% every year after the pandemic. The demand for other skills in the digital domains are barely growing at half the scorching pace set by AI and ML.

Randstad’s global delivery and talent officer Rohit Kishore said many Indian businesses are going through a digital transformation process, and it has driven up the demand for more and more AI professionals. It has already been demonstrated that AI/ML can automate a host of processes and significantly ramp up productivity achieved by humans.

Some of the businesses responsible for intensive use of AI and ML are the global capability centres (GCCs) of multi-national corporations based in India. Jung Bahadur, director for talent solutions at professional services firm Aon, said that the GCCs are technology and shared services arms of MNCs and since more and more such centres are being opened in India, they are increasingly trying to utilise talents of Indians in this sector to equip the parent companies with this AI-driven tools.

“Even traditional businesses now want to become digital, for which AI/ML is a key factor. These companies are across industries, including health and manufacturing. That is the difference between 2021 and now,” Bahadur told the newspaper.

In keeping with the latest trend in demand, the compensation packages for AI/ML professionals are much higher than many others, Aon’s data revealed. Professionals with experience between 0-5 years of experience in AI/ML working in an IT services firm earn between Rs 14 lakh and 18 lakh while they are paid between Rs 16 lakh and Rs 20 lakh in GCCs, and even higher – between Rs 22 lakh and Rs 26 lakh in product firms. For the same experience level, salaries for other digital tech roles move between Rs 8 lakh and Rs 22 lakh. If a professional in AL/ML have experience of 10-15 years, the package can move up to anywhere between Rs 44 lakh and Rs 96 lakh.

Increments of these professionals would also be higher. Bahadur said AI/ML experts could earn an increment of 12.5% salary increment this year, which is considerably higher than the average 9% for the rest of India Inc.

AI/ML professionals attract a premium of 10-15% in compensation package, feels officials of HR solutions firm Teamlease. In extreme cases the premium can even touch 50%.

According to Krishna Vij, business head at Teamlease, in the past few years, more than a dozen roles have emerged in the AI/ML domain. These roles are chatbot developer and prompt engineer at the entry level, while in the mid to senior levels, roles such as AI ethics specialist and robotics engineer are common.

In the education sector technology, one gets to see job titles such as AI curriculum developer and AI learning architect. According to Vij, IT professionals could also add skills perform in these roles. For example, IT security specialists can reskill themselves to become AI security specialists.