On February 24, during the Nasscom Technology and Leadership Forum 2025 in Mumbai, CEO Ravi Kumar S said, Cognizant has already trained 4 lakh people in artificial intelligence (AI) as part of its goal to impart such skills to 1 million individuals by 2026.
Kumar said, “So it’s a combination of what we do for ourselves, eat our own dog food, as they call it, take it to our clients, and then take it to the communities around us.”
Cognizant’s Synapse initiative, aimed at training employees in advanced technologies such as Generative AI. The company is collaborating with governments, educational institutions, and industry partners to train over one million people.
So far, Cognizant has trained around 30,000 employees in AI, with an additional 40,000 in the training pipeline. By the end of 2024, the workforce is expected to be approximately 336,800 employees.
Cognizant-Microsoft Partnership For AI Training & Adoption. Currently, upskilling employees in AI is a primary focus for many tech companies, especially as traditional firms face significant disruptions.
In the meantime, Kumar and Microsoft’s India & South Asia president Puneet Chandok highlighted the companies’ collaboration and various initiatives in AI training and adoption, in a media interview.
Chandok highlighted Cognizant’s efforts to create a future-ready workforce, particularly through its partnership with Microsoft. In April 2024, Cognizant acquired 25,000 Microsoft 365 Copilot seats for its staff, along with 500 seats each for sales and services Copilot. The company is currently utilizing about 20,000 copilots to enhance productivity.
For those unfamiliar, Microsoft Copilot is an AI-driven assistant that aids developers by suggesting code, completing functions, fixing errors, and boosting efficiency in real time.
Further, Chandok added, “So net-net, we have a massive runway and opportunity, with reference to data and (cloud) coming together, customers are looking for a pragmatic value. And for that to happen, partners like Microsoft and Cognizant have to come together.”
According to him, AI can “reduce the floor and raise the ceiling,” suggesting that it breaks the traditional relationship between experience and expertise, “You don’t need 15 years of experience to become a top 50 percentile coder.”
Chandok also provided examples of AI-driven transformations occurring across various industries.
For instance, Apollo Hospitals is developing AI copilots to assist clinicians in improving efficiency, he said. Other like MakeMyTrip is developing an AI-powered bot designed to assist customers in planning their travel itineraries, covering flights, buses, trains, and hotels.
Adding, “The good news is we’re seeing an impact in India like never before, from classrooms to boardrooms, commerce to communities, farmland to finance.”
Not only that, about 20 percent of the code in Cognizant is being written by machines and accepted by developers, he said.
AI will have a massive impact on the education and healthcare sectors, both Kumar and Chandok agreed.
AI is not just changing how work is done but also structurally changing how the workforce will be deployed across industries, Kumar said.
Further explaining, “This is probably the first time the productivity bump can be significantly higher than anything we have ever seen since the internet came in, 35-40 years ago.”
Also read: Viksit Workforce for a Viksit Bharat
Do Follow: The Mainstream formerly known as CIO News LinkedIn Account | The Mainstream formerly known as CIO News Facebook | The Mainstream formerly known as CIO News Youtube | The Mainstream formerly known as CIO News Twitter
About us:
The Mainstream formerly known as CIO News is a premier platform dedicated to delivering latest news, updates, and insights from the tech industry. With its strong foundation of intellectual property and thought leadership, the platform is well-positioned to stay ahead of the curve and lead conversations about how technology shapes our world. From its early days as CIO News to its rebranding as The Mainstream on November 28, 2024, it has been expanding its global reach, targeting key markets in the Middle East & Africa, ASEAN, the USA, and the UK. The Mainstream is a vision to put technology at the center of every conversation, inspiring professionals and organizations to embrace the future of tech.
