Cognizant and Microsoft announce partnership to expand adoption of generative AI

Washington, Apr 22 (PTI) Tech giants Cognizant and Microsoft on Monday announced a partnership with the goal of making the latter's generative AI and Copilots available to millions of users to transform enterprise business operations, enhance employee experiences and accelerate cross-industry innovation.

As part of the partnership, Cognizant purchased 25,000 Microsoft 365 Copilot seats for Cognizant associates, along with 500 Sales Copilot seats and 500 Services Copilot seats to enhance productivity, streamline workflows and transform customer experiences.

In addition, Cognizant will work to deploy Microsoft 365 Copilot to a million users within their global 2000 clients and across 11 industries.

Through Cognizant’s Synapse skilling program, 35,000 Cognizant developers have been trained on GitHub Copilot, with an additional 40,000 developers slated to receive training, a media release said.

This partnership, the two companies said, has the potential to significantly accelerate AI adoption and innovation in India.

AI is expected to add USD 450–500 billion to India’s GDP by 2025, accounting for 10 per cent of the country’s USD 5 trillion GDP target.

“Generative AI can be a game-changer for virtually every business in every industry, opening up new possibilities for innovation, efficiency and growth,” said Ravi Kumar S, CEO, of Cognizant.

“That’s why we are investing USD 1 billion in generative AI over the next three years and leading the development of new research to explore its potential for our clients, their employees and end customers,” he said.

“Our expanded partnership with Cognizant will help organisations harness generative AI to transform business operations, enhance employee experiences, and deliver new value for customers,” said Judson Althoff, executive vice president and chief commercial officer at Microsoft.

“By combining Cognizant’s industry expertise with Microsoft’s Copilot capabilities – including Copilot for Microsoft 365 and GitHub Copilot – we will help drive AI adoption and innovation for millions of users across its network,” he said. PTI