Bengaluru amongst top 12 tech powerhouses globally

Bengaluru: India’s tech capital Bengaluru is the largest tech talent market in the Asia-Pacific region (APAC), along with Beijing and Shanghai, with its tech workforce exceeding 1 million, according to a report by realty consulting firm CBRE out on Tuesday. Globally, APAC leads in the size of tech talent markets.

Bengaluru also has the most AI-related professionals in India, placing it on par with established US clusters like San Francisco and New York. In fact, AI-development talent is concentrated in the US and India, with the UK a distant third. Demand for this talent is growing fastest in Poland, the US, and Germany.

The report identifies Bengaluru as amongst the top 12 global tech powerhouses in terms of large and competitive talent pools, alongside Beijing, Boston, London, New York Metro, Paris, San Francisco Bay Area, Seattle, Shanghai, Singapore, Tokyo and Toronto.

Tech talent, globally, is most concentrated in the high-tech services and manufacturing sectors, which include software, cloud services, social media and computer hardware. Labour costs represent the largest expense for most non-manufacturing tech companies, followed by real estate.

Amongst the powerhouse markets, a software engineer’s annual compensation in Bengaluru was the lowest at $40, 967, and in fact, the only one below $100,000. San Francisco's is the highest at $184,593.

Looking at workforce demographics, Bengaluru ranks fourth amongst the 12 markets in share of the working-age population with 75.5% of its population falling in the working-age bracket. The city recorded a 2.4% growth in working-age population between 2019 and 2024, making it one of the fastest-growing globally in this segment.

Education is a forward-looking metric and a key component of a market’s tech talent outlook, stated the report. Countries with the highest educational attainment rates, defined as residents aged 25+ with a bachelor’s degree or higher, were Ireland, Switzerland, and Singapore, each with a rate of more than 45%. Belgium, the UK, Netherlands, and the US all had educational attainment rates above 40%.

India was listed at the 35th position with an educational attainment rate of 14.2%.

The report looks at global tech talent dynamics across 115 markets. The AI tech talent numbers did not include China as LinkedIn data was unavailable, said the report.

An aerial view of Bengaluru city near Nagavara lake October 21 2022.