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Informist, Friday, May 22, 2026

By Shakshi Jain and Durgesh Nandan

NEW DELHI/MUMBAI – Info Edge (India) Ltd. is confident of doing a "good job" in realty listing business 99acres in 2026-27 (Apr-Mar), company Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer Hitesh Oberoi said at a conference call with analysts Friday. He is particularly excited about 99Shorts, which is slated for expansion in major cities this year. It was first rolled out in the National Capital Region and aims at deeper engagement by helping users quickly browse, shortlist, and evaluate properties through short on-ground video tours.

Oberoi likened 99Shorts to "Instagram" of real estate projects and "test drive" of a new car. If this new offering takes off, Oberoi believes experience of users looking for a new home could change dramatically on 99acres. "If that happens, and if you become a destination site for new homes, and if we become the place where people start their new home search...this business could, you know, grow much faster than it has grown over the last few years," he said.

The chief executive expects billings growth to recover in the segement in the ongoing quarter. In the March quarter, the company implemented certain changes in sales organisation within 99acres to tighten certain key processes. This had a one-time transitional impact on Jan-Mar billings, he said.

99acres commanded a web traffic share of 49% in the March quarter, up from 46% in Oct-Dec, as per the management. "If we add a few more percentage points to share this year, I think we'll become a very, very strong leader in this market," Oberoi said, adding that revenue growth in the business follows with a lag. 

In 99acres, the company's artificial intelligence recommendation engine is driving 10-15% improvement in unique interests, with monetisation expected to follow as platform engagement strengthens, Oberoi said. 

99acres competes with MagicBricks and Housing.com in the broker business, Meta and Google in the new homes segment, and MagicBricks, Housing.com, and NoBroker to some extent in the owner segment. Oberoi sees substantial headroom for growth in the owner segment as 99acres charges only a small percentage of customers currently.

"Meta and Google are very, very strong players...the new home market is a large market and we are only now beginning to sort of make serious inroads into that market. It's a very big opportunity in the medium term for us," Oberoi said.

RECRUITMENT BUSINESS

Oberoi said talent hiring sentiment remains subduded. "It's not a hot market. It's a lukewarm market," he said, adding that companies are not rushing to hire quickly. However, Info Edge has seen "massive growth" in hiring for positions in domains such as AI and machine learning. Among global capability centres, small entities continue to hire while the larger ones are witnessing some pressure, he said. From another perspective, the premium hiring segment, with salaries ranging around INR 2.5 million or INR 3 million per annum, is growing faster than the mid-level segment for the last few quarters, according to Oberoi.

In the premium segment, Info Edge is deepening its focus through targeted offerings, including Naukri TopTier, IIMjobs, and Hirist, while growing employer branding solutions to improve monetisation.  

Oberoi said monetisation in JobHai continues to progress and the company will become more aggressive with the offering in Mumbai and Bengaluru this year. "In the value segment, JobHai is expected to play an increasingly important role over time. The success there depends on building real time labor matching and simple workflow solutions suited to the informal economy," he said, adding that Naukri's business-to-business growth drivers are broadening while organic volume and pricing remain the foundation.

Overall, the management believes it can maintain the operating margin in Naukri as long as the company's top line grows in double digits. Key priorities for the recruitment segment in FY27 include better matching, personalisation, and productivity. Oberoi said Info Edge will continue to investment in JobHai and artificial intelligence. The company has hundreds of AI projects in the works currently.

With over 1,000 clients onboarded and 30,000 job mandates already on AI-REX, early adoption is encouraging, Oberoi said. AI REX is Naukri's agentic AI talent-sourcing platform and JobHai is a blue-collar recruitment platform.

Later in the call, Oberoi said he does not expect a major reduction in headcount due to AI. Commenting on other ventures of the company, Oberoi said the dating market has been less competitive in the last couple of years and Aisle grew over 30% year-on-year in the March quarter.

Friday, shares of Info Edge ended 3.8% higher at INR 960.95 on the National Stock Exchange.  End

Edited by Akul Nishant Akhoury

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