New H-1B visa fees may have ‘negative’ impact on domestic placements at engineering colleges

BTech Jobs: Changes in United States’ H-1B visa policy, AI and changing patterns in tech hiring have engineering colleges bracing for a placement season that will likely be different in many ways.

Last week, the Donald Trump administration imposed a USD 100,000 fee for H-1B visas for international workers. To many institutions, including International Institute of Information Technology (IIIT) Hyderabad and Delhi Technological University (DTU), this has come as bad news. Both are expecting this to impact international placements “negatively”.

It has also raised concerns about whether and how they might impact recruitment by Big Tech and IT services companies in general.

“The Indian IT sector has been relying on the US market for getting projects at the service side for years,” an expert at IIIT Hyderabad explained. “Such projects may not come to India now. This shall affect the IT services companies drastically, particularly product development companies. With this, the hiring numbers obviously will go down. We estimate that compared to last year, this time hiring numbers, including domestic placement at engineering colleges, will be cut by almost 50%.”

A member of Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras’ placement cell told Careers360 that none of the ‘FAANG’ companies – Facebook (Meta), Amazon, Apple, Netflix, and Google (now Alphabet) – have extended pre-placement offers to final-year students this year where at least some were expected, following last year’s experience.

The advent of artificial intelligence is also forcing a change in the job roles available. Bulk-recruiters in the IT sector, such as Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), are now looking for expertise in AI, Large Language Models (LLM) and data analysis, pointed out Anil Parihar, head of training and placement, DTU.

Also read IT Jobs: India’s tech sector is redefining its talent pipeline; NASSCOM experts explain how

Given the change in skills recruiters are looking for, the methods of identifying talent has also changed. Parihar said that significant numbers of students are now hired through hackathons.

IIT placements and international offers

The placement cells at the IITs are quick to point out that the number of international offers constitute a small number of the total offers made during an IIT placement season. As per data in the 2024-25 placement reports of five institutions, IIT Delhi had the highest count of international offers – over 40. That said, these are often the most coveted offers and command some of the highest salaries.

IIT Placements 2024-25: International offers

IIT Bombay’s count for the latest year is not available. Last year, it saw 78 international offers from companies globally, including the US.

"Because the companies offering US locations are few in numbers – less than 10% – it won’t affect the overall placements this year,” said a student member of IIT Delhi’s placement cell. They are expecting sources to get more “diversified” with foreign companies from Hong Kong, Singapore, and Dubai stepping in to close the gap.

In 2024-25, BTech students at IIT Delhi received offers from Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, in addition to the US. The exact distribution wasn’t given.

Members of placement cells at IIT Madras and IIT Bombay agreed with their Delhi counterparty. “Out of the total number of students that get placed each year, international offers are pretty low. …Also, many of the international companies with Indian offices, consider students for Indian locations,” said a student from IIT Madras. He added that the new visa fees might impact students expecting international offers but the overall trend is likely to remain constant.

H-1B Visa Fees Impact: Other engineering colleges

At DTU, international offers amount to 5-10% of total placements. “Although they have said that the high visa fee is a one-time payment for securing an H-1B visa, this will definitely be for freshers getting hired from India,” said Parihar.

The expert from IIIT Hyderabad fears that the new policy will also impact domestic hiring and current placements in the IT sector which was already planning for job cuts. “Those placed in international firms in India now may not be able to visit the US even on the project basis, which has been a trend previously. Companies will be thinking of other alternatives now,” said the IIIT Hyderabad academic.

In August, Tata Consulting Services, the major recruiter of engineering graduates in India, announced it was laying off 12,000 employees. While TCS had already stopped on-campus hiring, Parihar believes this will impact graduates of smaller engineering colleges. “TCS is generally known for hiring coders. But that idea is shifting. Now they are using AI and they need people with expertise in AI, also called ‘Agentic AI’ roles. This shows a clear shift with other types of job roles emerging,” he said.

More PPOs, new roles, hackathon hiring

IIT Delhi has seen an increase in the number of PPOs this year. “Last year we had around 250-odd acceptances and this year we have around 300, which is positive," said the IIT Delhi student. He added, “We expect a 20% rise in domestic offers from last year. Because placements are usually half of internship numbers, we are positive on the domestic placements. We are expecting a quick revival due to the emergence of new roles in the market.”

IIT Madras has also seen a strong round of internship offers and more companies are registering for placements than last year. “The company registration has just started. While the pre-placements offers have been similar to last year, on the domestic offers front, either it will stay like last year or rise a little bit at IIT Madras,” a student from IIT Madras’s placement cell said. He added that there are more consulting and machine learning startups companies than last year, with an increase in machine learning and AI roles. “We expect this trend to increase in the next few years as well,” he added.

National Institute of Technology (NIT) Karnataka, Surathkal, is expecting better placement rates and salaries this year. “Overall packages are rising and better than last year. In August, we saw 40% more companies coming in with higher packages. Overall it is better,” said Anish S, professor in-charge.

Also read NIT Karnataka director: In AI era, BTech courses need both core and computers, and a curriculum over

At DTU, Parihar is seeing an uptick in off-campus placements, especially through hackathons this year. “Students are able to find good offers off-campus. And this trend is increasing. Students want to keep more options even after getting campus placements. Also, there are many companies which are taking students through hackathons through platforms like Unstop, etc., which are constantly happening throughout the year and even during the placement season,” he added. “In the on-campus placement process, there is a general written test and interview. But through these hackathons, companies are able to test student’s practical knowledge through live-projects.”

DTU and NITK both said they are seeing the number of roles in IT giants dropping while new companies join in larger numbers.

“Overall, the pay package is increasing with newer companies increasing. But the number of employees in each company is reducing. Now, offers for each organisation and in particular roles will be less, and this is happening due to AI. At one point all the IT companies were largely hiring software developers who are now heavily hit by AI. But at the same time, roles like data analytics engineers, ML engineers are increasing, because companies have to adapt to AI and then develop new systems,” said the academic from IIIT Hyderabad.