Chennai, Dec 4 (IANS): Job offers for students of the Indian Institute of Technology-Madras (IIT-M), in the first phase of placements for 2018-19, has increased by nearly 30 per cent, excluding pre-placement offers, compared to last year, a statement said on Tuesday.

The institute said that in the first three days of phase I placements (December 1-3), 133 companies made 680 offers to its students.

"When combined with the Pre-Placement Offers (PPOs) of 136, the total number of offers stood at 816 at the end of Day 3," IIT-M said in the statement.

Thirteen international job offers were also received.

During the 2017-18 academic year, 106 companies made 526 offers. As many as 20 start-ups have made 78 offers.

Speaking about this year's placements, Professor Manu Santhanam, Advisor (Placements), IIT-M, said: "We have had a great start to this year's placements. We hope the strong trend continues over the next four days as well."

According to IIT-M, analytics, consulting and finance sectors accounted for 33 per cent while core and research and development (R&D) sectors account for 37 percent.

The Information Technology sector account for 29 per cent. The FMCG sector accounted for less than 1 per cent.