The Hindu: Cognizant’s Group Chief Executive for Technology and Operations Says the IT Industry Needs to Focus More on Value and Transform into Knowledge Industry

R. Chandrasekaran, Group Chief Executive for Technology and Operations, Cognizant

“As an industry, we can’t rest on our past laurels,” says R. Chandrasekaran. “We can’t focus just on the cost alone. We need to focus a lot more on value. Secondly, a lot of customers are pushing us hard now. They are asking us to lead them from front now, rather than just executing in the back. Therefore, from a services industry, we really need to move to [become] a knowledge industry. It is not just about deploying a lot of people on a lot of projects. There is a need to build domain capability, and work on the leading edge of technology and offer superior services. The industry has to go through that transformation.”

He adds, “Traditional outsourcing will continue because of the cost advantage. But we see a lot more opportunities in newer pastures such as consulting, infrastructure and BPO. And these are all in the early stages of the global outsourcing model. So, there is a lot of room to grow if you develop capabilities in those areas, which is what we have done in the last five years.”

According to Chandrasekaran, breaking the linearity between headcount and revenue is vital for Cognizant. “So we are investing in creating intellectual property. We don’t call them products, as they are still platforms or building blocks that we will reuse across multiple client situations. Overlay services on top of these building blocks, and thereby offer a unique proposition. We are seeing early success in some of those platforms.”

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