There has always been a keen interest in understanding the salary structures of individuals employed by Indian startups and tech giants. In the midst of ongoing discussions about moonlighting in the tech industry, the focus has shifted towards the compensation of tech professionals employed by these companies.
Recently, a Twitter thread emerged with the aim of providing insights into the payment scales of software engineers in Indian startups. The thread leveraged data from over 50,000 engineers to paint a more comprehensive picture of the salaries and increments received by software engineers in startups, comparing them to those in tech giants.
Amit Singh, an employee at the startup Weekday, shared this enlightening Twitter thread. Weekday specializes in aiding other companies in hiring engineers.
According to the infographic embedded in the thread, ShareChat, a social media platform, offers the highest compensation package to its software engineers among the 107 Indian unicorns. As per the social media post, an engineer with four years of experience at ShareChat earns ₹47 lakhs per annum (LPA).
CRED, a fintech company, follows closely behind, with a salary of ₹40 LPA for its software engineers. Companies like Meesho, Swiggy, Dream11, and InMobi provide salaries ranging from 35 to 40 LPA for their software engineers.
In contrast, other unicorns such as Oyo, PayTM, and Byju’s find themselves at the lower end of the spectrum, offering an average package of 20-25 LPA to their software engineers. ShopClues, on average, compensates its tech professionals with ₹12 LPA.
Examining the increment cycle for software engineers in Indian unicorns, the data reveals a modest 10% increase in pay as these employees accumulate experience. Amit Singh suggests that this might explain the frequent job-switching trend among professionals.
A comparative analysis was also conducted between the earnings of software engineers in product-based startups and those in service-based companies like TCS, Infosys, and Wipro. The findings indicate that employees in product startups receive salaries that are 160% higher than their counterparts in service-based firms.
In summary, the data indicates that while big tech companies offer a salary of 10 LPA for a software engineer with four years of experience, startups are enticing talent with a more lucrative package of 26 LPA.
