How America’s visa chaos may spark the next tech boom in India

Selva’s decision reflects a broader rethink among specialized tech hands. From the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) to tier-II colleges, generations of engineers built their dreams around a US visa, a job in Silicon Valley, and the promise of global success. For decades, that journey shaped careers, secured families, and turned India into the world’s premier supplier of tech talent.

Now, a proposed $100,000 fee on new H-1B visas has made it commercially unviable for American companies to hire from India. Rating agency Crisil estimates the change could add $150–$550 million in annual costs for top Indian IT companies, while brokerage Jefferies warns profits could shrink by as much as 1.5% per H-1B worker—a hit that makes the old model unworkable.

The stakes get higher with artificial intelligence (AI). In early 2026, Indian IT stocks suffered a sharp decline as clients began repricing contracts based on AI-driven productivity gains. AI-powered workflow tools are automating core outsourcing tasks that once sustained the H-1B pipeline.

For the country’s brightest minds, this moment presents a clear choice. They can move to countries rolling out the red carpet, or build at home at a time when India’s startup and deep-tech ecosystem is finally gaining momentum.

Change in the air

The growing ambiguity around H-1B visas is driving a surge in interest in job opportunities back home from Indian talent working overseas.

“We’re seeing nearly a five-fold increase in US-based talent actively exploring opportunities across India,” says Anshul Lodha, managing director at PageGroup India, a recruitment company. “Fintech, banks, consumer tech, conglomerates, and PE/VC funds are increasingly open to hiring US-trained talent.”

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Talent with US experience brings best-in-class training, exposure to the world’s most competitive market, and deep technical expertise, Lodha says. “Their experience proves invaluable in scaling businesses globally and building robust, process-driven organizations.”

But compensation remains a sticking point. “In mature sectors like financial services and healthcare, expect steeper pay corrections,” Lodha explains. “In emerging sectors like defence, AI, aerospace, and renewables, compensation often remains at par with the US.”

Overall, professionals can expect salary adjustments of 25–50%, depending on the role.

Mudit Jhunjhunwala, managing director at Nimbus Solar Solutions, who returned from the UK when India’s ecosystem was still maturing, sees a clear evolution. “With each passing year, India has announced itself on the global stage. Opportunities are much better,” he says.

From the employer side, he notes that larger companies are actively hiring globally trained returnees. “Candidates with experience abroad are definitely more confident and committed to the collective goal… They should focus more on cost of living rather than a ballpark figure coming out of direct conversion.”

Selva concurs, noting, “Dollar to rupee conversion doesn’t make sense. Indian salaries typically range from one-third to two-thirds of what you’d earn in the US Based on my experience, getting 40% of the US salary in India is decent.”

According to Desi Return, a community working with Indian professionals planning their return, most returnees describe salary adjustments as manageable once purchasing power parity is considered, but find infrastructure and workplace culture to be persistent friction points.

On popular public forums such as Reddit’s r/returnToIndia, discussions reveal a raw mix of motivations and trade-offs. One user, after years on an H-1B visa with aging parents and AI job fears, wrote: “I’m torn about whether moving to India is the right choice. Am I potentially giving up future career and financial growth?”

Smruti Sarangi, a professor who returned to India after pursuing a PhD and working in the US, and who now teaches at IIT Delhi, puts it differently: “Being a US returnee is not important; real skills are. Success depends on proven ability, not foreign stamps on a resume.”

For some, the pull runs deeper than credentials or compensation. Writing on LinkedIn, Karan Dhundia, managing partner at ZS Healthcare Consulting, who returned three months ago, describes the shift: “People don’t need frameworks to open up… The hunger here is different… People dream big. And that ambition is infectious.”

The shift extends to education. Indian student arrivals in the US plunged 44.5% in August 2025—the steepest drop since the pandemic—sliding to 41,540 in a single year.

The shift is visible in education too: Indian student arrivals in the US fell 44.5% in August 2025—the steepest drop since the pandemic.

“The American dream is now substantially more difficult, and students are rethinking that choice entirely,” says Sudhanshu Kaushik, founder of the North American Association of Indian Students (NAAIS).

Emerging faultlines

Returnees with advanced AI and product experience will have an edge because of the skills gap in India’s massive talent pool. India produces over 1.5 million engineering graduates annually, yet only half are considered employable in core tech roles, according to industry body Nasscom and staffing firm TeamLease.

“Curricula still don’t reflect gen AI, cybersecurity, or cloud architecture,” says Venkat Venkatraman, professor of management at Boston University.

The skills gap aside, India’s innovation ecosystem also lacks depth. The country has 125 unicorns and raised $5.7 billion in the first half of 2025, yet deep-tech testbeds, early-stage capital, and corporate–university linkages remain thin. And while more than 1,800 global capability centres (GCC) operate in India, only one-third to 40% of activity is truly innovation-led within that ecosystem, experts say.

Again, while GCCs pay better than legacy IT companies, a senior engineer here still earns a fraction of his/her US peer. “You need tentpole talent to move or stay in India,” says Aadesh Goyal, former CHRO of Tata Communications. The fix, he says, is structural. “As Indian companies move up the value chain and build technologies and products, the job market will take care of the rest, creating premium roles, and stronger career paths and compensation, including equity.”

“The issue is lack of capital, not lack of talent,” says Mohandas Pai, former Infosys chief financial officer (CFO) and a prominent tech investor. “With capital, you can hire talent from anywhere. Barring the most experienced and highly skilled talent in a few product companies in the US, there is enough talent here.”

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Swadeshi tech push

All this is playing out at a time when India is sharpening its self-reliance narrative. India’s startup ecosystem has grown rapidly over the last half decade. Recognized startups have jumped from about 50,000 in 2020 to more than 200,000 today, according to figures from the department for promotion of industry and internal trade, placing India among the world’s top three hubs.

Funding has cooled from the 2021 peak of $40 billion, but the correction is proving healthy. Venture capital investments touched $3.5 billion across 355 deals in Q2 2025, up from $2.8 billion across 456 deals in the previous quarter, according to KPMG.

Indeed, after the 2022 funding winter, founders pivoted toward profitability and sustainable growth. Deep-tech is now leading the rebound, and roughly 3,600 startups in the space have raised $1.06 billion through July 2025—double last year’s pace. The government’s second ₹10,000 crore Startup Fund tranche will focus entirely on deep-tech, while industry players at Semicon India pledged $1 billion for AI and semiconductor ventures.

This renewed confidence is powering deeper bets in AI-native tools, cybersecurity, robotics, semiconductor design, and other hard-tech areas—pulling in senior engineers who once aimed for Silicon Valley.

For many founders, this moment feels like a turning of the tide. “We’re not seeing US H-1B tightening as a setback,” says Kunal Singhal, managing director/founder of Eazy Business Solutions in Gurugram. “It’s a signal for a structural shift”—a cue that India is finally ready to build at home what it once exported.

We’re not seeing US H-1B tightening as a setback…it’s a signal for a structural shift.
—Kunal Singhal, founder of Eazy Business Solutions

All of this is reshaping talent demand. “High-end roles in AI, data, cybersecurity, and product are taking off,” says Neeti Sharma, chief executive officer (CEO) of TeamLease Digital. Specialized AI expertise remains thin, so companies are aggressively upskilling mid-level engineers.

By 2035, more than half of India’s startups could emerge from tier-II and tier-III cities, extending innovation far beyond Bengaluru and Delhi, according to a report from the Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE). If this holds, the ecosystem could create 50 million jobs and lift its share of gross domestic product (GDP) from the current 4–5% to nearly 15%.

Pain points

Infrastructure, however, remains a key pressure point, particularly for those who return. India’s cloud, chip, and AI compute backbone isn’t yet at the scale needed, notes Marc Einstein, research director at Counterpoint Research.

“Only when India creates an environment comparable to the US—in infrastructure, innovation, and opportunity—will talent truly stay,” adds Goyal of of Tata Communications.

The evolution of GCCs is central to this shift. IDC expects the number of GCCs in India to grow 30% over the next five years.

Financial institutions such as banks and investment companies, as well as MNCs in manufacturing, retail, and healthcare, have set up product development, automation, engineering, data and analytics, and even cloud computing processes here, notes Rajiv Ranjan, associate research director at IDC India.

Big names include Daimler Motors, HSBC, Morgan Stanley, Metro Corporation, Tesco, and Biocon.

But readiness for AI-led innovation remains uneven. “Honestly, they may not [be fully ready],” says Ranjan. Many organizations are still determining where AI fits into their broader strategy. While some projects reach production, others stall or fail to deliver expected outcomes. As a result, several GCCs continue to rely on system integrators and service providers rather than building deep AI capabilities in-house.

The good news is that the influx of experienced professionals is driving both industry and the government to accelerate development. Last November, the government ₹4,500 crore”>cleared ₹4,500 crore to upgrade Semiconductor Complex Limited’s (SCL) fab in Mohali, India’s oldest government semiconductor facility, aiming for a 100x capacity boost on its 180 nm line (a chip technology).

Union minister Ashwini Vaishnaw projects chip parity with the US/China by 2032, with three units starting production in Q1 2026.

To achieve this, aggressive talent renewal is essential. IDC’s Ranjan argues for industry-linked curricula, continuous certifications, and open-tech programmes that keep pace with AI-led work.

Indeed, for India to move toward real product innovation, globally trained returnees, who truly understand AI-native workflows, are now more important than ever.

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Venkatraman of Boston University says the new benchmark should be “how many IP and proprietary AI models India can truly call its own”. Real progress will be evident in patents, products that ship globally, and AI systems designed for India-scale problems in climate, agriculture, and multilingual access.

For returnees like Selva, the trade-offs are clear. But the opportunity to build in India’s evolving ecosystem makes the equation work, for now.

As Counterpoint Research’s Einstein puts it, “The shift has only just begun.” The real test, however, is whether India can truly host its returning talent—and give it reason to stay, and whether it can turn that talent into a sustained competitive advantage, one that shapes the next decade of its tech story.