India, April 4 -- Artificial Intelligence (AI) adoption among Indian firms is more than 25 per cent, and the new tools can add more than $400 billion to the GDP over the next decade. As productivity gains shoot up, and layoffs become the norm, as we have mentioned several times in these columns, they create structural tensions, and a rethink about existing business models within the IT and software services sector. Tech that promises growth begins to weaken the earlier tech that built the former. For three decades, Indian IT scaled on a simple equation. More clients, more work per vendor, more people, more revenues, and more profits.

Billings are tied to efforts, teams are sized to timelines, and global clients outsourced works and proce...