Top 25 gainers of H-1B visas in 2009
 

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H-1B visas have been the most sought after over the years. It was a matter of hours before the entire Congressional mandated cap of 65,000 American work visas was exhausted. However, the year 2009 was different. For the first time nearly 20,000 slots remained vacant even seven weeks after the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) started accepting applications for the financial year 2010.

Lately, though there has been an increase in the demand for H-1B visas, the applications still continue to fall 6,000 short of the Congress-mandated cap (as of first week of December).

Also, Indian IT companies, traditionally the biggest recipient of H-1B visas, saw as much as 80% fall in their H-1B quota. In fact, the country's no.1 IT company, TCS, is missing from the list of top 50 H-1B recipients of 2009! However, there are a few MNCs who saw a slight increase in their H-1B numbers this year.

Wondering who all got H-1B visas in 2009 and how many? Read on to find out.

Wipro
 

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The company got 1,964 H-1B visas during the year 2009.

In 2008 Wipro got 2,678 H-1B visas.

Microsoft Corp
 

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In the year 2009, software giant increased its H-1B tally. The company got 1,318 H-1B visas.

In 2008, Microsoft got 1,037 H-1B visas.

Intel Corp
 

http://infotech.indiatimes.com/photo/5343956.cms


The chip numero uno too increased its H-1B visas tally in 2009. The company recieved 723 H-1B visas during the year.

Intel got 351 H-1B visas in 2008.

IBM India Pvt Ltd
 

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One of the biggest IT employers in India, IBM India got 695 H-1B visas during the year 2009.

The number was almost double the H-1B visas it got in 2008, 381.