Growing revenue without growing headcount: a big tech privilege?

For three years, the American tech giants have been achieving what every executive dreams of: selling much more with barely more employees. Is this a privilege reserved for Silicon Valley? To find out, we collected the revenue and headcount of the 120 companies in the SBF 120, the index of the largest companies listed in Paris, between 2023 and 2025. We start in 2023 because it was the first full year of generative AI: ChatGPT came out at the end of November 2022.

In the United States, tech grows without hiring; the rest of the economy, not yet

Let us start with the figures. Between 2023 and 2025, Microsoft's revenue grew by 33%, that of Alphabet, Google's parent company, by 31%, and that of Meta (Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp) by 49%. Over the same period, their headcount rose by 3%, 5% and 17%. In other words, each employee brings in a quarter more than two years ago. Microsoft goes even further: in its financial year ended June 2026, its revenue grew by 18% with 5,000 fewer employees.

Source: company annual reports, via stockanalysis.com; financial years 2023 to 2025, index 100 in 2023.

The markets were quick to do the maths. More revenue with roughly the same payroll means rising margins: Meta's operating margin went from 35% to 41% between 2023 and 2025, and Alphabet's from 27% to 32%. The combined net profit of the three groups rose by 59%, to nearly $300 billion. The stock market followed. At the end of 2022, Microsoft, Alphabet and Meta were worth $3,250 billion together; at the end of October 2026, nearly $8,900 billion. Meta is worth almost five times more than at the start of 2023. AI does not explain everything, of course: these three groups also sell AI, and their share prices reflect hopes as much as results.

What is striking is that other large American companies are not following, or not yet. The Financial Times showed this in a chart by John Burn-Murdoch, and the accounts confirm it. At Accenture, the global consulting and IT services giant, revenue grew by 9% between its 2023 and 2025 financial years, and headcount by 6%. At Deloitte, it is +9% and +3%. At Visa, +23% and +18%. Only Bank of America stands out a little: 9% more revenue, with 213,000 employees three years in a row.

Source: annual reports of Accenture, Visa and Bank of America (via stockanalysis.com) and Deloitte Global press releases (rounded headcount); index 100 in 2023.

The only other spectacular case is, once again, a software company. Spotify, the Swedish group listed in New York, increased its revenue by 30% between 2023 and 2025 while cutting its headcount by 20%. Decoupling is concentrated where many developers work, the first profession to be transformed: at Anthropic, more than 90% of code is now written by Claude, according to its IPO filing. Visa, which nonetheless employs many engineers, shows that this is not enough. For the rest of the American economy, including the firms that sell AI to their clients, the gap between revenue and headcount is no more than a few points.

In France, six companies are taking the same path, but not the ones you would expect

Now to France. Of the 120 companies in the index, we kept 67, those whose 2023 and 2025 figures are comparable. We excluded biotechs that do not yet have any sales, holding companies, property companies and groups that made a large acquisition or disposal, such as Renault, which took its engine plants (Horse) out of its scope in 2024. The result: for the median company, +5% revenue and +3% headcount in two years. Weighted by company size, it is +6% and +3%, excluding Stellantis, whose 19% fall distorts the total. So there is no decoupling: in most large French companies, revenue and headcount move in step.

Six companies nonetheless stand out. Thales, Ipsen, BNP Paribas, Crédit Agricole SA, JCDecaux and Bureau Veritas have increased their revenue by at least 10% since 2023, with almost stable headcount (at most +5%). Thales gained 20% in revenue with 5% more employees; BNP Paribas, 12% with 1% fewer employees. The gap is still half the size of that at the American giants, but the curves have the same shape.

Source: company universal registration documents and press releases, calculations by the AI at Work Observatory; median calculated each year across 67 companies.

Is this the effect of AI? Honestly, we do not know, and these companies do not say. Thales is benefiting from rising defence budgets, Ipsen from sales of its medicines, JCDecaux from the Paris Olympic Games in 2024. But two of them clearly present AI as a source of productivity. BNP Paribas has launched a plan to transform its support functions “which will rely in particular on Artificial Intelligence”, on a cost base of around €15 billion. At Bureau Veritas, more than 10,000 employees use the group's internal assistant every week. Crédit Agricole SA plans to spend €500 million on AI between 2026 and 2028. It is reasonable to think that AI is starting to play a role, at least in the banks.

The most interesting finding lies elsewhere. Companies that sell human time (IT services, engineering consultancy, call centres) should be the first to benefit from AI. In January, in Davos, the head of the Indian group HCLTech explained that it was already enabling “3 to 5% growth without having to add people”. In France, we are far from that. At Capgemini, Sopra Steria, Alten and Teleperformance, revenue has stalled since 2023, and so has headcount. Capgemini even added around 15,000 employees in two years, excluding acquisitions, for roughly flat revenue.

Source: universal registration documents and press releases; Capgemini, reported revenue, which includes one quarter of the acquisitions made at the end of 2025.

The explanation lies in their business model. When you bill by the day, a consultant who works twice as fast thanks to AI bills half as many days: the gain goes to the client. These companies know it. Capgemini writes in its universal registration document that automation increasingly affects entry-level tasks, which forces it to rethink its pyramid (many juniors at the base, few seniors at the top) and to recruit more selectively. Teleperformance has expanded its AI and efficiency programme, and booked €109 million of restructuring costs in the first half of 2026. Alten's CEO puts the efficiency already gained thanks to AI at 15%. AI is in their plans, not yet in their curves.

A final lesson comes from the 2025 universal registration documents of these large companies, 21 of which we have reread. Almost all of them now present AI as a source of productivity, and six explicitly link it to their headcount or their organisation. Under the banner “AI to drive efficiency”, Schneider Electric announces €349 million of savings in 2025, mainly linked to simplifying its workforce. Société Générale wants to “pool teams and step up automation and the use of artificial intelligence”. Ipsen has set up a working group to measure the effect of AI on its workforce, role by role. But none says how many jobs are at stake. Publicis even takes the opposite line: its CEO, Arthur Sadoun, presents AI as a driver of growth and margin, not as a threat, and the group has 10% more employees than in 2023.

The chart: 67 French companies against American tech

To finish, the full map. Each dot is a company in the SBF 120, placed according to the change in its headcount (from left to right) and in its revenue (from bottom to top) between 2023 and 2025. Above the first dotted line, revenue per employee is rising; above the second, it is rising by more than 10%. The American giants are far above. On the French side, no company exceeds +20% in revenue per employee. In navy blue, our six top performers, which grew while hiring very little. A few others cross the second line by cutting their headcount, such as Ubisoft: that is a different story. Hover over a dot, or tap it, to see the company's name.

Source: universal registration documents and press releases (21 checked line by line), stockanalysis.com, abcbourse.com; Microsoft, financial years ending in June.

Growing without hiring is still a privilege, but it is already no longer one reserved for Silicon Valley.

Vincent Pavanello, co-founder of Mister IA

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