For years, the American Dream came with a familiar career progression for thousands of Indian technology professionals: secure a job with a global technology company, get an H-1B visa, build a career in the United States and eventually work towards a Green Card. It was hardly a straightforward journey, given the lottery system, long waiting periods and immigration paperwork, but it remained a worthwhile pursuit. Now, one of the companies that helped make this career pathway possible is making that journey considerably more complicated. IBM has decided to discontinue H-1B visa and Green Card sponsorship for the majority of roles within IBM Consulting, its largest business division, which employs more than 150,000 people globally. According to an internal document reported by Bloomberg, affected employees can explore opportunities with IBM outside the US or leave the company by the end of 2026. The company has not disclosed the exact number of employees affected.
IBM’s explanation is fairly straightforward: the availability of skills and client requirements have evolved, while its participation in high-skilled US visa programmes has been declining for several years. On paper, this sounds like a workforce strategy adjustment. In practice, however, it has consequences that extend well beyond recruitment budgets. For an employee who has spent years building a career in the US, visa sponsorship is not simply an administrative benefit. It is tied to the ability to stay, work and plan a future in the country. A Green Card application can represent years of waiting, professional compromises and personal decisions. When an employer withdraws that support, the uncertainty is not confined to a job description. It can affect an entire household. And while IBM has offered the possibility of continuing employment outside the US, relocating across countries is hardly as simple as changing an office location on LinkedIn.
The timing is particularly significant. IBM’s decision comes against a broader shift in the American immigration environment, where employer-sponsored foreign talent is facing greater scrutiny. The Trump administration has tightened its approach to skilled-worker immigration, including introducing a one-time $100,000 fee on new H-1B petitions and intensifying scrutiny of the employment-based Green Card process. In October, Microsoft, Adobe and several major outsourcing companies, including Cognizant, Infosys and Tata Consultancy Services, were suspended from the Permanent Labor Certification programme, commonly known as PERM, which is an important step in the employment-based Green Card process. IBM’s decision is separate from those suspensions and the company has not been accused of the same violations. Nevertheless, the direction of travel is difficult to ignore. The question of who gets to work in America is becoming increasingly entangled with questions of cost, compliance and domestic employment priorities.
For India, the implications deserve attention. Indian professionals have historically accounted for a substantial share of H-1B beneficiaries, making changes to US immigration policy particularly consequential for the country’s technology workforce. According to US government data cited by Reuters, Indian nationals accounted for 71% of H-1B visa beneficiaries in the previous year. For Indian IT services companies, the US has also been a significant market, supported by delivery models that combine local client-facing teams with talent distributed across India and other global locations. If visa sponsorship becomes more expensive, restrictive or uncertain, companies may have to rethink how they deploy people across geographies. More work could move to offshore delivery centres, global capability centres and other locations where specialised talent is available without the same immigration dependencies. This could create opportunities for India, but it would be premature to assume that every role restricted in the US will automatically translate into a job created here. The work itself, the skills required and the economics of delivery will determine where those opportunities eventually land.
There is, however, a larger contradiction at the heart of this debate. America wants to strengthen its domestic workforce and protect employment opportunities for its citizens. That is a legitimate policy objective. But technology does not develop within national borders alone. The industry has grown through the movement of people, ideas, research and specialised skills across countries. Restricting access to global talent may offer short-term relief to sections of the domestic workforce, but it also raises questions about the long-term competitiveness of American businesses. For technology companies, the challenge is no longer simply finding the best person for a role. It is finding that person within an increasingly complicated framework of immigration rules, costs and business priorities. For Indian professionals, meanwhile, the lesson may be to build careers around skills that travel, rather than opportunities that depend on a single geography. IBM’s decision does not mean the American Dream is over. But it does suggest that the route to it is being rewritten, and global technology talent will have to adapt accordingly.
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