AI talent mobility seen in high gear

As the domestic artificial intelligence market draws increasing capital inflow and gains more support as a key innovation driver, talent in the sector has shown signs of heightened mobility this year, according to data released by Maimai, a domestic recruitment platform.

As of July, 41.1 percent of employees at top AI companies in China had set their job status on the platform as "open to opportunities", indicating a strong willingness to switch jobs, said Maimai.

"February marked a pivotal turning point," said Yang Ying, director of business operations at Maimai. "Since then, the number of AI professionals who switched their status to 'open to opportunities' has surged noticeably."

Yang added that about 10,000 AI professionals are newly marking themselves as open to job opportunities each month, while over 1,000 companies had posted AI-related openings on the platform by the end of July.

The platform categorizes job status into three types: "open to opportunities", "watching the market" and "not looking for jobs for the next six months", designed to serve as indicators of talent mobility in different industries.

In contrast, professionals in the broader internet industry show significantly less job-hopping intent, with only 14.7 percent marking themselves as actively seeking new roles, as of July.

"The talent supply-demand ratio in the AI sector last year was roughly one-to-one — one candidate for each job opening. But in the first half of this year, the ratio has shifted to four candidates competing for three positions," said Lin Fan, founder and CEO of Maimai. Lin also noted a 30 percent jump in the volume of AI job applications submitted in the first half of this year alone.

Zhou Jian, a data analyst at the International Finance Forum, said the emerging rise of large language models such as ChatGPT was likely a watershed moment that accelerated AI development.

"Landmark technological breakthroughs can draw heightened market attention, drive capital into AI-related sectors and serve as powerful catalysts for growth," Zhou said.

This week, the IFF released its report on the AI sector, which identifies talent shortages as one of the major roadblocks facing the AI industry. Still, the report remains optimistic about long-term talent growth, projecting a global increase of 2.85 million AI professionals over the next five years, bringing the total to approximately 5.85 million.

It also showed that currently, there are about 3 million AI professionals worldwide, with 32.6 percent based in the United States and 24.4 percent in China.

The report revealed that nearly 50 percent of AI professionals are engaged in core areas like research and development (32.6 percent) and data analytics (16.2 percent), with a dominance of R&D-related hiring across major AI companies.

"This situation suggests that the industry is still in an early development phase," Zhou noted.

Campus recruitment data from Maimai showed that a significant portion of entry-level AI salaries still fall in the lower end. Positions offering monthly salaries under 20,000 yuan ($2,781) account for 32.5 percent, while those exceeding 50,000 yuan make up only 18.2 percent. More than 55 percent of roles offer salaries below 30,000 yuan.

However, Yang from Maimai added that the recruitment platform has observed rising demand for AI talent beyond core technical roles as the country's new economy sectors accelerate AI adoption.

"Opportunities are increasingly emerging in non-tech functions such as product management, HR business partnering, branding and operations," Yang said, adding that candidates with AI project experience often see a notable uptick in profile views after updating their resumes.