The agreement was signed at SAPPHIRE by Francisco D'Souza, President and CEO of Cognizant, and Bill McDermott, President of Global Field Operations, SAP AG, and member of the SAP Executive Board. At the conference, Cognizant was honored with an SAP Pinnacle Award in recognition of its contribution toward expanding the SAP-focused ecosystem.
The agreement is said to mark an important milestone in the relationship between the two companies, which have been working together to enable organizations to realize enhanced business results from their investments in SAP solutions and become stronger businesses. The Cognizant SAP Touchstone Center, set up in 2008 at Cognizant's facility in Bangalore, India, is already working in coordination with SAP Co-Innovation Labs worldwide as the hub of development and innovation at Cognizant in support of SAP solutions.
In keeping with the philosophy of collaborative innovation, the Touchstone Center and SAP Co-Innovation Labs help to deliver value-added SAP solutions across industries and domains, develop prototypes for various customer scenarios and proof of concepts, perform interoperability studies, and leverage service-oriented architecture (SOA), providing enhanced flexibility, agility and innovative efficiencies in enterprise applications. Through this extended relationship, Cognizant and SAP plan to expand their global reach.
"Cognizant has consistently demonstrated close alignment with SAP, and its elevation to a global services partner marks a significant milestone in our relationship," said Zia Yusuf, Executive Vice President, Global Ecosystem and Partner Group, SAP AG. "This expanded partnership is a testament to our collaborative relationship and an important part of our strategy to expand our ecosystem to drive continued customer success. "
With this agreement, Cognizant joins a select group of companies that are a part of the SAP global services partnership program. As a new global services partner, Cognizant will continue to make ahead-of-the-curve investments in developing next-generation SAP platforms, enhancing its SAP consulting practice, creating dedicated SAP sales resources, and supporting marketing activities across North America, Europe and Asia Pacific.
"The expanded partnership underscores our commitment to innovative SAP solutions in line with our vision of enabling businesses to meet the challenges of the new and changing global economy," said Francisco D'Souza, President and chief executive officer, Cognizant. "Cognizant's global services partnership with SAP is already enabling clients to not only benefit from greater operational efficiencies, but also transform their businesses. By leveraging the world's best SAP consulting talent, domain expertise and industry best practices, our clients can achieve innovative SAP implementations that deliver unique business value."