Cognizant today announced it was named a “Leader” in “The Forrester Wave(TM): Global IT Infrastructure Outsourcing, Q1 2009” by Paul Roehrig, Ph.D. Cognizant moved to the “Leaders” category for the first time in the benchmarking report, which evaluated 15 global firms with a track record of success in infrastructure services.
The Forrester study evaluated and ranked Cognizant IT Infrastructure Services (IT IS) on the basis of a comprehensive methodology across 31 criteria – as well as an additional 25-item reference client survey – relating to current offerings, strategy, and market presence. Cognizant IT IS received the highest possible scores for client feedback on service quality, customer value proposition and vision, and investment to support growth strategy.
“… solid performance across the current offering criteria, balanced with an equally solid strategy, edged Cognizant into the Leaders. Cognizant has a good story to tell around current delivery – supported by solid client reference scores – and good plans for growing the business,” according to the report.
Cognizant’s IT IS line of business offers a comprehensive portfolio of managed services and consulting offerings that span end-user and enterprise computing, infrastructure security, as well as network and convergence services. The Forrester evaluation specifically cited Cognizant’s remote infrastructure management capabilities, or RIM 2.0:
“The value proposition for RIM 2.0 is strategically sound. Perhaps most impressively, Cognizant is among the best at managing external margin expectations to allow pricing flexibility and internal investment. The Cognizant strategy continues to be largely on target and is driving continued maturity in the current offering.”
“Forrester Research offers an educated and unbiased analysis of the global IT infrastructure services market, and we are especially pleased that our strong client satisfaction scores contributed to their evaluation – a strong testament to the business value we deliver,” said Robert Boles, Vice President, IT IS, Cognizant.
“We believe the fact that Cognizant has advanced into the Leaders category speaks to the depth of our domain expertise and our ability to leverage an ITIL-compliant platform across our global delivery network that takes remote infrastructure management to the next level. Our RIM 2.0 framework not only enables us to help our clients significantly reduce costs, but delivers unprecedented operational maturity improvements, greater workflow automation, and highly flexible sourcing options with our productized managed services.”
The 15 global firms in Forrester’s assessment delivered about $83.9 billion worth of infrastructure services over the past year. The 349,000 dedicated-infrastructure services employees supported about 9,400 clients. Overall, the firms included in this study accounted for about $384 billion in total annual revenue over the past year.
The April 6, 2009 report, “The Forrester Wave(TM): Global IT Infrastructure Outsourcing, Q1 2009,” further elaborated on the role of the IT infrastructure outsourcing services to the global economy: “Many sourcing professionals are now trying to rapidly assess whether they can realize near-term cost savings by outsourcing some or all of the IT infrastructure.
But smart technology decision-makers are also now looking at IT infrastructure outsourcing as a way to deliver near-term cost savings while positioning IT as more of a business enabler for the future – rather than a ‘keep the lights on’ tax to the firm. This strategy is actually driving a healthy growth in certain areas of the outsourcing business even in the context of a highly distressed economy.”
To learn more about the Forrester report, “The Forrester Wave(TM): Global IT Infrastructure Outsourcing, Q1 2009,” please visit www.forrester.com.