TEANECK, N.J., Oct. 1, 2015 /PRNewswire/ -- Cognizant (NASDAQ: CTSH) today announced it has been placed in the "Winner's Circle" in the new HfS Research Blueprint Report: Healthcare Payer Operations.  HfS Research is a leading independent global analyst firm for the business and IT services industry. 

For The HfS Blueprint: Healthcare Payer Operations report, the firm evaluated 15 leading global service providers on their claims management, member management, provider data management, and health and care management capabilities and offerings, along with their analytics and enabling technology platforms. Service providers demonstrating excellence in both execution and innovation across these areas were placed in the "Winner's Circle." 

Cognizant is recognized in this Blueprint report for "driving new ways of addressing challenges and opportunities in healthcare with solutions for 'speed to market'." Specific strengths highlighted include:

• Depth, forward thinking, and investments in technology and consulting, with an innovation program that can help "bring to life" the use of digital technologies;
• Business Process as-a-Service (BPaaS) options that plug in and quickly provide services to meet customer needs, underscoring Cognizant's vision of helping the industry move from high fixed-cost, capital intensive models to variable, consumption-based cost structures;
• Creation of a centralized Medicare/Medicaid Center of Excellence that helps clients increase internal synergies for enrollment, claims, medical management reconciliation and reporting.

"Healthcare organizations are experiencing unprecedented demands on their time, systems, and capability as the industry shifts its focus to consumers and pay for performance, in the midst of on-going regulatory requirements," said Barbra McGann, HfS Executive Vice President, Business Operations Research. "Partners like Cognizant can help payers and healthcare providers take advantage of solutions that bring together industry-specific experience and digital technologies like automation and analytics."

"We work closely with our clients to help them digitally transform and reimagine their businesses for the new realities in healthcare, which include member and patient engagement, regulatory challenges, cost pressures, rapidly changing technologies and real-time information requirements, " said Krish Venkat, President, Healthcare and Life Sciences at Cognizant. "We continue to make strategic investments in technology to deliver industry leading BPaaS solutions that empower our clients to embrace new business models and harness new digital technologies while escaping the capital intensive, high fixed cost models that have long dominated the industry."

About Cognizant's Healthcare and Life Sciences Practice
Cognizant's Healthcare and Life Sciences practice, which includes the TriZetto software portfolio, is committed to helping change millions of lives for the better by partnering with clients to build solutions to healthcare challenges, continually improve the way they do business, set the pace in clinical development, strengthen their regulatory infrastructure, and increase competitiveness. With over $3.5 billion in annualized revenue, Cognizant's healthcare practice is ranked among the top 5 on the Healthcare Informatics Top 100. Cognizant serves 28 of the top 30 global pharmaceutical companies, 20 of the top 25 health plans in the U.S., 3 of the top 5 pharmacy benefit management companies in the U.S., 9 of the top 10 biotech companies, and 12 of the top 15 medical device companies. With a large team of dedicated professionals including doctors, pharmacologists, physicians, biomedical engineers, pharmacists, biostatisticians, medical writers, and GxP consultants, the practice provides domain-aligned consulting, IT, business process, software and as-a-service solutions globally.

About HfS Research
HfS Research is the leading independent global analyst authority and knowledge community for the business and IT services industry. HfS serves the research and strategy needs of business and IT operations leaders across finance, supply chain, human resources, marketing, customer management, and core industry functions. HfS provides detailed and thoughtful analyst coverage of the various areas that impact successful business outcomes, namely, process automation and outsourcing, global business services frameworks, mobility, analytics, and social collaboration. HfS also focuses heavily on talent acquisition, development, and motivation strategies. HfS applies its acclaimed crowdsourced Blueprint Methodology™ to evaluate the performance of service providers in terms of innovating and then executing against those business outcomes.

About Cognizant
Cognizant (NASDAQ: CTSH) is a leading provider of information technology, consulting, and business process outsourcing services, dedicated to helping the world's leading companies build stronger businesses. Headquartered in Teaneck, New Jersey (U.S.), Cognizant combines a passion for client satisfaction, technology innovation, deep industry and business process expertise, and a global, collaborative workforce that embodies the future of work. With over 100 development and delivery centers worldwide and approximately 218,000 employees as of June 30, 2015, Cognizant is a member of the NASDAQ-100, the S&P 500, the Forbes Global 2000, and the Fortune 500 and is ranked among the top performing and fastest growing companies in the world. Visit us online at www.cognizant.com or follow us on Twitter: Cognizant.

SOURCE Cognizant