We had called it the Growth Machine last year. Between April 07 and March 08, the period considered by Dataquest for its ranking, Cognizants total revenue grew 45% in dollar terms, which translated to about 29.5% in rupee terms. However, its India IT exports revenue (estimated by Dataquest based on work delivered out of India, and which excludes BPO revenue) grew 38%, thanks to a higher offshore ratio. Though there is a huge drop from last years growth, it is highest among the services companies in the DQTop20.

And this growth took place despite its over-dependence on America (with 82% revenue coming from there) and a traditional heavy tilt toward ADM, even in comparison to other offshore players.

Higher growth in all new areastesting, infrastructure management, and BPOhelped even while it made a conscious effort to grow European revenue. In FY 08, it contributed 16% to Cognizants revenue, as compared to 13% in the previous year.

Recognizing that most offshore players have struggled to grow their business in Europe beyond UK, Cognizant took a strategic decision to go for partnership with existing European players, providing them offshore capability. The first was a partnership announced last year with Ordinam a Dutch IT provider. It was followed in JFM by another strategic alliance with Germanys T-Systems, taking 1,150 employees of T Systems India to its fold.

Rank-8
l Start-up Year: 1994 l Products & Services: IT services and BPO l Employees: 48,000 (India) l Address: #5/35, Old Mahaballipuram Road, Thoraipakkam, Chennai-600097 l Tel: +91-044-42096000 l Fax: +91-044-42096060 l Web: www.cognizant.com
Highlights n Inaugurated delivery center in Buenos Aires, Argentina n Francisco DSouza, president and CEO, Cognizant named the Ernst&Young Entrepreneur of the Year in 2007 n Significantly increased consulting group, reaching a headcount of 1,800 consultants n  Has provided a guidance to touch $2.95 bn in calendar year 2008 Strengths p Strong depth because of verticalized approach pHas gone aggressive on partnerships in tough geographies which may help to penetrate markets faster Weaknesses q Still takes conservative approach to new areas q Still over-dependent on the American market		Francisco DSouza, CEO Rajeev Mehta, COO R Chandrasekaran, president and MD Gordon Coburn, CFO Malcolm Frank, sr VP, Strategy and Marketing T Sridhar, chief people officer DK Sinha, head, Sales

Cognizant signed a five-year SAP applications outsourcing contract with Kimberley-Clark, and a multi-year infrastructure management service contract with publishing giant, Simon & Schuster. It strengthened its hold in the pharmaceutical space by signing a multi-year contract with Merck and followed it with another $95 mn deal with AstraZenecca. It also acquired marketRx, a KPO focused in pharma sales and marketing outsourcing.

While Cognizant has built depth at the cost of breadth in all areasservices, verticals, and geographiesit faces challenges of an uncertain market in some of its core constituencies. Most offshore players out of India have at least begun to offset the US slowdown by looking at India domestic market. Cognizant is yet to take a decision on that, let alone developing the market.

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