Jamshedpur, Feb. 24: One is not enough. At least not for XLRI students.

For the second consecutive year, the annual salary offered to an XLRI student crossed the $100,000-mark during lateral placements.

While Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis offered the same amount to a student in 2007, software major Infosys has given at least six such offers to students as part of its fast track programmes this year. Infosys would train selected students in India for a year, after which they would be placed either in the US or Europe and the salary would be $100,000.

Over 100 offers were made across all domains (see chart) to about 90 students under the lateral schemes meant for students with experience.

Al Ghanim group from West Asia has also made eight offers to the B-school students. This was the first time when any leading West Asia company knocked on XLRI doors.

Students of finance, consultancy, operations, marketing and human resource among others have received good offers this year, said sources.

“The large number of offers in niche areas reinforces the fact that XLRI is the preferred campus for recruitment by corporates when they look for extraordinary talent,” said Uday Damodaran, the chairperson of the placement committee at XLRI.

The average salary package offered at the recently concluded lateral placements at XLRI was Rs 15 lakh. The highest salary offered was Rs 22 lakh this season, made by a leading investment banking concern.

What was most interesting this year was the growth in the number of general management offers made by Indian conglomerates and business houses.

“With the final placements slated to begin in a matter of days and companies pouring in for pre-placement talks with students, expectations are high for a robust end to the placement season for the batch of 2008,” added Damodaran.