New data from Otta, a start-up dedicated to helping job seekers find roles at fast-growing companies, shows signs of a strong recovery in the tech jobs market. The news will come as a relief to job seekers trying to navigate the bumpy jobs market and demonstrates that tech companies continue to be an exciting place to work.
September saw 3,495 tech roles advertised in the UK, which is close to the 3,552 jobs advertised in March before lockdown restrictions were first introduced, and a 71% increase from the number of jobs available in June (2,041). Today’s figure continues to climb, despite the new measures that have been in place to tackle the second wave of Covid-19, demonstrating the tech industry’s resilience and ability to adapt to challenging environments.
CEO and co-founder Sam Franklin said, “While it is an uncertain time for both companies and job seekers, our data offers some reassurance to people that are looking for jobs. While job vacancies in some industries have been slow to recover, we have seen a strong recovery in the tech jobs market in recent months, with lots of great companies continuing to hire. Tech companies are disruptive and operate in fast-growing markets. Despite a difficult economic backdrop, many are still growing fast.
Investment in the tech sector continues to thrive as well. UK start-ups raised £663m during lockdown with investors showing interest in fintech, artificial intelligence, security, and blockchain technologies. In April, the government announced plans to inject £500 million into promising start-ups and scale-ups, further improving confidence in the sector and indicating we can expect job vacancies to rise as investor-backed tech companies grow.
Software engineering, product management, design, and data analysis continue to be the most important specialisms for tech companies and, as of September, make up over half of the roles being hired for (at 1,924). There is an increasing demand for talented engineers in particular, with the number of engineering roles higher now than they were in March (at 1,116 and 1,037 respectively).
What’s more, fintech continues to dominate as the most prominent tech sub-sector in London, with 843 roles currently live. This is still a drop from the 1,139 roles advertised in March, but positions are rising month by month thanks to some of Europe’s major success stories including Revolut, Checkout.com, iwoca, and GoCardless. Revolut continued to hire throughout the height of the pandemic, advertising for more roles than any other scale-up in March, June and September.
Deputy Mayor of London for Business, Rajesh Agrawal said, “These findings are a reassuring sign that London’s world-leading tech sector is at the forefront of the capital’s economic recovery – and will be key to the UK’s future prosperity. There’s no doubt that significant challenges lie ahead but I’m clear London will remain one of the world’s best places to work and invest in tech.”
Interestingly, there are tech sub-sectors that have increased hiring and have higher levels of job vacancies now than before the pandemic took hold. Both gaming and social have boomed thanks to more people trying to occupy themselves over lockdown periods. They are two of only a handful of sub-sectors where vacancies are now above pre-pandemic levels. The number of roles at gaming companies rose from 110 in March to 179 in September, while jobs at social companies jumped from 74 in March to 234 in September.
Online events platform Hopin is one example of a company that is accelerating because of the pandemic’s impact on in-person events. They raised $40m in June this year and, since April, has grown its team by 300% in six months with plans to double in size again by the end of 2020. What’s more, the team is fully remote in response to changing working conditions.
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