New Delhi: Demand for specialised mid career professionals in India’s healthcare global capability centres is rising sharply with about 93 per cent of 67,000 projected job openings in 2026 seeking candidates with three to 12 years of experience, a report said on Friday.
The report from Quess Corp said that GCC healthcare hiring nearly doubled in 2025 as demand surged 97.5 per cent from 32,000 roles in 2024 to 63,200.
AI is expected to be the fastest-scaling capability in healthcare GCCs and its penetration could rise from about 60 per cent of centres today to 80–90 per cent by 2030 as it moves into clinical, R&D, operations and product workflows.
“Hiring nearly doubled last year, and demand for AI and data talent has risen almost 150 per cent since 2023. Yet the defining issue is the talent gap,” said Kapil Joshi, CEO, Quess IT Solutions.
India’s healthcare GCC ecosystem now comprises 155 GCC organisations employing roughly 3.2 lakh professionals.
The report added that the nature of hiring is shifting from traditional support functions to specialised roles in AI, data analytics, clinical research and regulatory affairs.
The report also highlighted a growing talent crunch in these areas, with the availability of professionals struggling to keep pace with hiring requirements.
Demand for Data, Analytics & AI roles rose 147.3 per cent between 2023 and the 2026 forecast, from 1,781 to 4,404 positions. Regulatory, quality & compliance demand more than doubled to 6,147, while R&D, clinical development, biometrics & statistics demand rose 82.5 per cent to 5,421 roles.
Despite an installed workforce of approximately 3.2 lakh professionals, specialist talent availability remains constrained. The report identified supply-to-demand ratios of just 1.6:1 in both data, analytics & AI and market access, patient services & analytics, compared with an overall workforce-to-annual-demand ratio of 4.8:1.
The report noted that experienced professionals dominate hiring as fresher demand weakens. Nearly 38,391 of the 67,000 job openings are for professionals with 3–7 years of experience, while another 23,856 are for those with 7–12 years of experience.
Entry-level hiring demand declined 12.4 per cent year-on-year in Q2 2026, even as overall quarterly hiring demand increased 6 per cent.
Bengaluru and Hyderabad continue to anchor India’s healthcare GCC ecosystem, together accounting for 62.2 per cent of the existing workforce and 58.4 per cent of projected hiring demand in 2026.
Bengaluru leads with an installed talent base of 1.09 lakh professionals and projected demand for 23,600 roles, driven by technology, digital health, AI and medical-device engineering.
(IANS)
