As a newer returning Hawken player, the xp on the Tech doesn't seem to be the issue.
The fact that the Tech is the ONLY mech that operates in this capacity on the other hand seems, as someone else rightly put, shoehorned into the model.
In my limited experience thus far, the Tech seems to be the single best way to mitigate and manage the observably over-rapid TTK.
The fact that the healing weapon is the ever irritating 'Healer Leash' forcing a Tech to dedicate itself to running around behind a heavy I'd argue is a major part of hte problem there too.
Small hitpoint pool coupled with the short range, steady stream lock on beam means a Tech has to essentially commit to being a tag along to 1, maybe 2 wingmen to patch them up steadily. This further relegates the Technician to playing 'Mister Target' as they have to be right there at the point of engagement rather than doing their support role from a more tactically viable position. Even if this is intended to keep the Tech in current format from being overly dangerous, it locks it into operating in an undesirable way imho.
I would have expected the Helix to operate much more similarly to the Nanite Restoration System from Global Agenda, namely a 'shot' that upon impacting the target does it's fixed value of repair (and can even apply that as a HoT to stop it from burst healing someone ridiculously).
But that is probably besides the point.
I would argue that Technicians are artificially influencing the landscape simply because the damage model is so small in the first place, far too much twitch over tactical, but I may just be biased in this regard and as I said, this is a newcomer perspective.
I will be curious if that feeling holds after more hours of play but I would certainly think the leveling component of the Technician is the least point of concern overall; leveling ones pilot level doesn't seem to be that critical or difficult regardless of what you're driving, time commitment wise so I must be missing the criticality of this element?