The combined entity resulting from the merger of Tech Mahindra Ltd andSatyam Computer Services Ltd may hire as many as 10,000 new employees in the current fiscal year, said Vineet Nayyar, CEO of Tech Mahindra.

“We are trying to secure more efficiencies internally, we’ll see how it works out, but I think it will be anywhere between five to 10,000 range,” Nayyar told Reuters. The two companies together have about 75,000 employees. Tech Mahindra hired 4,413 employees in the first nine months of the last fiscal year that ended in March, whileSatyam added 3,014 new staff in the same period.

Tech Mahindra, a unit of Mahindra & Mahindra , bought Satyam in a government-backed auction in 2009 after its founder admitted to one of India’s biggest accounting frauds.

The long-awaited merger will create India’s fifth-largest software services exporter by revenue. (Reuters)