Mumbai: Cryptocurrency exchanges are facing a challenge hiring experienced professionals due to shortage of people with relevant crypto skills in India, while demand for talent has soared with several well-funded crypto firms scaling up and diversifying their businesses.
Headhunters and industry executives say that the 25–30 exchanges that operate in India are witnessing demand for talent across functions such as technology, compliance, legal, risk management, marketing, and sales to manage and scale their projects at a time when the government is in the process of bringing in stricter regulations and more government oversight.
“The availability of blockchain talent in India for cryptocurrency exchanges, even though growing, is scarce, and that’s one of the reasons why we have to offer steep salary packages for techies ranging from Rs 1.5-7 lakh per month,” Praveenkumar Vijayakumar, chairman at Malaysia-based crypto trading platform Belfrics Global, said. “As and when exchange operations and enterprise adoption of blockchain increase, the demand for blockchain talents will become more competitive”
In most cases, the average salary offered to tech employees across exchanges is around Rs 2 lakh per month for those with two to four years of experience, say industry trackers.
India is one of the fastest growing cryptocurrency markets globally. The January to June growth was 641 % over 12 months, according to a report by Chainanalysis, a New York-based blockchain data platform. In the last few months, two Indian exchanges—
CoinSwitch Kuber and
CoinDCX—have achieved unicorn status.
“Currently, there are at least 40-50 CXO level openings between the top ten exchanges. Most of the big exchanges that are well-funded are scaling or pivoting, so demand for talent across levels is robust,” said Ashish Sanganeria, senior partner and national technology lead at global head-hunting firm Transearch.
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Take, for example, CoinSwitch Kuber, the leading Indian crypto exchange that has grown from 25 to more than 380 employees in the last one and a half years. “The majority of hiring has taken place in engineering and product teams, but we have also strengthened our leadership team,” said Ashish Singhal, cofounder and chief executive at CoinSwitch Kuber.
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