A string of layoffs and closures at India’s GCCs in recent months is highlighting a shift in the country’s GCC story, with parent-company restructuring, and AI-led productivity gains putting some centres under pressure even as India continues to attract new investments.
Recent exits include Cambium Networks, which shut its Bengaluru GCC in October, affecting around 200 employees, and Hy-Vee, which closed its India engineering centre in June, impacting around 150 employees.
According to Alouk Kumar, founder and CEO of Inductus Group, parent-company restructuring and global cost-cutting account for an estimated 50–60 per cent of layoffs in India’s GCCs. AI-led productivity and workforce redesign account for another 15–20 per cent, while GCC-specific portfolio weakness contributes 10–15 per cent. 5–10 per cent is linked to GCC closures or parent-company exits, with the remaining cases stemming from local restructuring, performance issues, acquisitions and other factors.
Gaurav Vasu, CEO and founder of UnearthInsight, echoed that key reasons include sector-specific challenges, as automotive, SaaS, and manufacturing face global weakness. More than 400 GCCs could remain under stress over the next few years.
AI is also shrinking traditional software development cycles and reducing the need for large developer teams, particularly in SaaS and software product GCCs, while driving global restructuring. Additionally, some GCCs face operational constraints as their mandates have changed from when they were set up 10-15 years ago.
“GCCs are tenured, and some may not live up to their full potential, still running like a back-office or support operation. If the leadership doesn’t view the India center as an IP creation or innovation center, there may be full-fledged shutdowns. The company may then take work back to a service provider, or to the headquarters,” he said.
Yajna Prakash, Partner & Executive Director, Acclime India noted that over 50 per cent of India’s GCCs are estimated to be sub-scale, with easily replaceable skills and limited ownership across engineering, product or P&L. AI is disrupting these centres, particularly the 1.1–1.3 million employees in repeatable roles.
“80 per cent of GCCs surveyed by EY reported that less than 10 per cent of their leadership roles are based in India. Our Ecosystem Dilemma research, based on structured interviews with GCC leaders across seven industry segments, found a similar pattern. India can design at a world-class level, but decision-making authority often remains with the parent organisation,” she said.
Layoffs
Kumar said GCCs saw 5,500–6,000 layoffs in 2025 even as they added around 150,000 jobs, with cuts largely driven by parent-company restructuring and portfolio recalibration rather than weakness in India’s GCC model. Industry estimates put 2026 layoffs at 4,000–5,000, again primarily due to parent-company restructuring.
Smaller GCCs are particularly vulnerable when they lack scale, have narrow mandates, limited technology adoption, few opportunities to diversify capabilities or struggle to attract talent.
Moreover, Prakash said, it is getting more expensive to run a GCC in India, particularly at the specialist end. GCC salaries are projected to rise 10.4 per cent in 2026, while GCC roles carry about a 20 per cent premium over equivalent non-GCC roles. AI, GenAI, and ML roles command skill premiums of up to 40 per cent.
“Attrition stands at 15–20 per cent, and 60 per cent of hiring now comes from other GCCs. Smaller centres are competing for the same scarce talent as larger centres with deeper pockets. India remains highly competitive on talent depth and speed to scale. What has changed is the idea that a GCC can justify its existence on labour cost alone,” she said.
However, smaller GCCs are not necessarily a bad proposition. Kumar noted that the future belongs to smaller but highly specialised GCCs.
“A 75-100 headcount centre specialising in AI/ML, cybersecurity or product engineering can be more valuable than a 500-person centre doing commoditised transaction processing. The new measure is not how many people a GCC employs, but what it owns,” he noted.
Strategic Scaling
Prashakth Kamath, Marketing Director & Head of Global Demand Generation at Straive, said the key question is how a GCC’s mandate is changing, with centres potentially shrinking in some areas while becoming more strategic in others.
“Scale provides advantages, but by itself does not guarantee relevance. A smaller GCC owning a critical product, platform, AI capability or specialised domain function can be important to the parent organisation. Equally, a much larger centre with a mandate concentrated around highly standardised or increasingly automatable work may face pressure to transform,” he said.
Jaikumar Subramanian, Partner and GCC Industry leader- Diversified Industries, Deloitte South Asia, said, “The GCC value proposition is evolving beyond cost efficiency. As demand grows for specialised talent, particularly in AI and advanced technologies, success will be measured by value created, innovation delivered, IP generated and the strategic importance of the mandate. AI will streamline repetitive processes while unlocking new opportunities across enterprise modernisation, customer experience, data-led decision-making and product innovation.”
He noted that operating models are likely to become more flexible, with captive, BOT, hybrid and outsourced structures continuing to coexist. Technology partners will remain integral to the ecosystem, supporting capabilities across cloud, cybersecurity, engineering, managed services and AI transformation. Importantly, changes in ownership or delivery models do not necessarily imply a shift of work away from India. The next generation of leading GCCs will be defined by their ability to combine specialised capabilities, technology, productivity and ecosystem partnerships to secure increasingly strategic global mandates.
Transformation
Experts expect India’s GCC landscape to polarise between 2026 and 2030, with large, strategic multi-function centres and small, specialised, AI-native GCCs gaining ground. Kumar noted that large GCCs may account for 40 per cent of new mandates and specialised centres for 60 per cent, while smaller centres focused on routine, replicable work face the greatest risk of restructuring, consolidation or closure.
Over the next 3–5 years, 30–40 per cent of smaller GCCs could successfully transform and remain captive, 20–30 per cent could become specialised centres, and 10–20 per cent could be carved out, acquired or transferred through build-operate-transfer models. The remainder could shrink materially or close.