Start-ups make 13% of job offers in IIT-Madras

Start-ups have hired 114 of the 880 students - or 13 per cent - placed at the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras (IIT-Madras) at the end of the first phase of placement.

Among the start-ups that made job offers were Ola Cabs (29 offers), Flipkart (19) - behind only information technology giant Cognizant Technology's 36 offers - and Urban Ladder (13). Housing.com made 11 offers and Snapdeal.com over six. However, how many of the last two companies' offers were accepted wasn't clear.

"This year, around 65 start-ups participated in the placement, and offered a total of 122 jobs. The number of offers accepted out of this was 114," said Babu Viswanathan, professor, mechanical engineering and advisor, training and placement, IIT- Madras.

He added that start-ups on average offered Rs 10-20 lakh per annum as salary, which is competitive in the market, and students were also keen to take up the offers, since visibility in start-ups is higher right from early on. Last year, only three-to-five start-ups had participated in the placement process.

In the first phase of placement 295 companies offered jobs to 880 students up to the end of December 19, compared to 263 companies placing 905 students during the entire placement season ended April 30, 2014.

The other companies that made job offers were Robert Bosch (16), Citicorp Services India Ltd (15), TVS (15), Goldman Sachs (14), Reliance Industries (13), Eaton Technologies (12), GE (11), Photon Interactive (11), Target Corporation (11), General Motors (10), Honeywell (10), ICICI Lombard (10) and Tata Motors (10).