Mumbai, June 28 (IANS) India’s technology sector accounts for around 31 per cent of the cumulative gross leasing across the top seven cities in India in Q1 2025, a report showed on Saturday.

After a temporary dip during the pandemic, tech sector leasing has strongly rebounded to 26 per cent in 2024 and further to 30 per cent of total office leasing in Q1 2025 (January-March), according to a JLL report.

The technology sector has consistently remained the mainstay of office demand resulting in 130.8 million sq. ft of gross leasing from 2017 through Q1 2025, the report said.

“The narrative of India’s office market is linked to the evolution of our tech sector. While the overall sector remains the anchor, it is the GCC segment that is now in the driver’s seat,” said Samantak Das, Chief Economist at JLL.

India’s Global Capability Centres (GCCs) are rapidly transitioning from basic cost-arbitrage centres to become hubs for innovation, research and development, and global business transformation. This evolution is mirrored in India’s service export trends, where the proportion of business services has grown significantly from 19 per cent in 2017-18 to 26 per cent in 2023-24, the report further states.

Tech occupiers, especially GCCs, are laser-focused on securing Grade A office spaces in markets with high concentrations of skilled professionals. Bengaluru and Hyderabad account for a combined share of 64 per cent in GCC leasing, and this dominance is no coincidence; it’s a strategic decision based on their unparalleled talent ecosystems, according to the report.

Furthermore, the rise of emerging markets like Ahmedabad, Kochi, Coimbatore, Indore and Jaipur, which now host over 190 GCC units, presents the next frontier of growth, offering cost and talent diversification benefits that forward-thinking companies are already leveraging, the report said.

Foreign tech occupiers show a clear preference for Delhi NCR, leveraging the region’s abundant core tech talent, robust infrastructure and proximity to key clients. This pattern is often seen in firms that predate the widespread GCC model or have specific business development mandates that benefit from the capital’s extensive commercial ecosystem.

Homegrown tech firms maintain a more distributed presence, reflecting their broad pan-India business footprints and need to access diverse talent corridors. While Delhi NCR, Bengaluru, Chennai, and Hyderabad remain vital hubs, their balanced approach underlines a strategy to access diverse talent corridors. This allows them to support large-scale operations and tap into various skill sets without over-reliance on a single, highly competitive talent pool, the report said.

According to the report, Mumbai emerges as a magnet for BFSI and management talent within the tech domain. Pune and Chennai serve as deep hubs for specialised R&D, ERP implementation, and product development.

In every instance, leasing decisions in these markets are tightly coupled with the availability of relevant, niche talent, showcasing a precision-driven location strategy that looks beyond raw numbers to skill-specific ecosystems, the report added.

–IANS

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