The average annual salary offered to the students of the Indian School of Business, Hyderabad, this year climbed to Rs 905,000 from Rs 830,000 last year.

This is around Rs 230,000 more than the average salary offered at all the Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs) this year. The average salary offered at the country's top business school, IIM-Ahmedabad, this year was Rs 708,000.

Of the 273 job offers made by 144 companies during this year's campus placements at the Indian School of Business, 20 were for foreign jobs.

The highest international salary offered was $151,000 per year, which is 46 per cent higher than last year. The highest domestic salary offered rose to Rs 20 lakh (Rs 2 million) from Rs 18 lakh (Rs 1.8 million) last year.

The average salary offered to the institute's first batch in 2002 was Rs 543,000.

Of the 219 students in this year's batch, 192 participated in the placement exercise. The rest are either returning to their family businesses or sponsoring companies or are interested in setting up their own enterprises.

The companies that offered the highest salaries this year are Wipro, Infosys, Cognizant, Novartis and Johnson & Johnson. A number of companies from the United States, Europe, Singapore, Dubai and Hong Kong also participated in this year's placement programme.

The biggest recruiters this year were Dell Computers and business process outsourcing firm Vcustomer, along with Wall Street firms Goldman Sachs and Lehmann Brothers, which visited the Indian School of Business campus for the first time to recruit middle-level managers.

Infotech companies accounted for 38 per cent of the total number of jobs offered. The infotech-enabled services, pharmaceuticals, financial services, consulting and fast-moving consumer goods sectors were far behind in the recruiters' list.

"Although placements at all the major business schools have been good this year, getting a middle-level management entry for students at such salaries is a different ball game altogether,' said Ajit Rangnekar, deputy dean at the Indian School of Business. The number of offers made for middle-level managers also climbed 22 per cent to 221 this year.

According to Rangnekar, the diverse backgrounds of the 200-odd students in this year's batch also helped in creating a competitive environment.

The average work experience of the students this year was five years and nearly half of them had an engineering degree, whereas others were from fields as varied as fashion, hospitality, market research and media.

"Our students are a bit more mature compared with other business schools. So our emphasis is always on honing their leadership and soft skills," Rangnekar said.

"Since 50 per cent of the country's businesses are still family owned, we are planning to start courses on entrepreneurship and family businesses from next year," he added.