India’s IT services sector has delivered its strongest signal yet that corporate artificial intelligence is moving from experimental pilot to revenue-generating reality. Shares of Tata Consultancy Services jumped more than 6% after it announced a multi-year, multi-million-dollar deal to transform ABB’s global network operations using AI, while the Nifty IT index surged to a one-month high. TCS also reported a 5% year-on-year rise in quarterly net profit and a total contract value of $9.5 billion, reinforcing the view among Mumbai analysts that AI-driven deals are beginning to offset the margin pressure that has weighed on the outsourcing industry.

Yet the transition is uneven. Executives at Cognizant, which reported 30% growth in its Mexico operations over two years, observe that the main barrier to scaling AI is no longer technology but the efficiency of deployment. Fragmented data, poor integration with internal processes and a narrow focus on automating isolated tasks keep many organisations stuck in pilot mode. In response, enterprises are adopting more cost-efficient architectures—combining specialised models, GPU optimisation and FinOps practices—to prevent computing costs from eroding project returns. Viewed from Mexico City, the nearshoring trend is accelerating AI adoption, as companies build operations with AI capabilities from the ground up rather than retrofitting legacy systems.

The talent equation is being rewritten in parallel. TCS plans to build a corps of up to 8,900 forward-deployed engineers who will embed with clients to customise and integrate AI tools, putting it in direct competition with the likes of OpenAI and Microsoft. In India’s university system, Galgotias University secured more than 5,500 job offers for its 2026 class, with technology firms accounting for the largest share—a sign that industry-academia alignment is intensifying. In Latin America, recruiters report that demand is shifting toward professionals who combine technical mastery with continuous learning and business acumen. Meanwhile, EY has embedded agentic AI into its global assurance platform, augmenting 130,000 professionals in a human-led, AI-powered model that the firm is using as a reference for clients.

In Southeast Asia, the picture is more fragmented. Indonesia’s financial regulator has designated agentic AI as a strategic technology investment for banking, and private-sector AI investment reached $91 million between late 2024 and mid-2025. Yet economists in Jakarta caution that 95% of Indonesian enterprises are micro-businesses that do not naturally require AI, while small and medium firms face high service costs and low digital literacy. Government incentives for local AI providers targeting smaller enterprises are being proposed as a necessary bridge. The next factual milestones will be the full first-quarter earnings season for Indian IT firms, which will reveal whether AI contract wins are translating into durable margin expansion, and the implementation of Indonesia’s AI governance guidelines for the banking sector.