Web wise

Calcutta, July 21: Cognizant Technology Solutions is looking to provide a combination of social, mobile, analytics and cloud technologies (SMAC) to keep up with the growing digital needs of consumers.

There is also a surge in demand from government entities for cloud-based services and solutions with more people wanting information while on the move.

“Citizens now demand services on the fly. So, mobility and cloud are key ingredients for government solutions. Cognizant has not been into the government space before. Now, for the last one to two years, we have started the vertical. It is a new segment for us. Government organisations are scalable and that comes through cloud,” said Raj Bala, chief technology officer of Cognizant.

Bala was speaking on the sidelines of an IT conclave organised by The Bengal Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

“Many enterprises have taken their normal applications to the cloud. If you look at retail, consumer goods and information media, no one wants anything in their data centre anymore. We are looking at mobility and cloud in a big way and this will grow because of analytics. Their device-based market is very huge,” he said.

Cognizant has also tapped the wearable devices market. It has initiated a pilot project for a leading company in the insurance sector whereby sensors will help monitor diabetic patients.

According to Bala, instead of looking at mobility or cloud individually, use of the SMAC as a stack would result in effective applications for the end users.

“You will have to look from the SMAC perspective. At least two or three will join together to make a meaningful application. We can make cost-effective solutions for government initiatives and enterprises, too,” he added.

Meanwhile, research firm Gartner has lowered its projections for global IT spending for 2013 to $3.7 trillion, a 2 per cent increase from $3.6 trillion in 2012. Gartner, in its previous forecast, had projected a growth rate of 4.1 per cent in 2013.

The decline is mainly on account of the recent fluctuations in dollar exchange rates.