Cognizant expands R&D partnership with British industrial software maker Aveva

Information technology provider Cognizant Technology Solutions Corp. has said that it has expanded its research and development (R&D) partnership with British industrial software company Aveva Group to develop industrial software for a range of sectors, from water and energy, to food and infrastructure.

The $650 million Aveva, which is a UK-listed company with its Indian office in Hyderabad, has a decade-long partnership with Chennai-based and New Jersey-based Cognizant.

“Our industrial software portfolio is the result of years of innovation and business alignment with customers. Digitally transforming the engineering, operations and asset lifecycle is key for our customers to compete globally, drive growth and gain competitive advantage,” said Andrew McCloskey, chief technology officer and executive vice-president of R&D at Aveva. He added that Cognizant’s global presence and delivery framework will help the partnership to succeed.

The multi-year, multi-million-dollar deal will help customers to modernise and implement digital technologies to boost competitiveness, profitability and return on capital, Cognizant said in a statement. Cognizant's digital, Industrial Internet of Things (IoT), product, cloud and software engineering teams will work with Aveva’s experts to design and build a range of engineering and industrial software.

The software products will span the entire engineering lifecycle, including simulations, design, construction, commissioning, planning, operations management, monitoring and control, as well as performance optimisation, the statement said. The companies have together worked on several industry-specific solutions for customers in the oil and gas, chemicals, power and utilities, food and beverage, infrastructure and other sectors, it added.

Rajaram Radhakrishnan, global head for manufacturing, logistics, energy and utilities at Cognizant, said, “Industry 4.0 is here and is now transforming the world of manufacturing. Our expanded collaboration will help customers accelerate their Industry 4.0 journey and transform into a connected enterprise with greater reliability, efficiency and safety across their value chain.”

Radhakrishnan added that the information and operational technologies are converging and the combination of Cognizant’s digital capabilities and Aveva’s domain expertise will strengthen the solutions, apart from creating new market opportunities.

In 2009, Cognizant entered into a global product R&D alliance with Invensys Operations Management, a UK-based global provider of technology systems, software solutions and consulting services to the process and manufacturing industries. Invensys was acquired by Schneider Electric Software, the industrial and enterprise software solutions business of France-based energy group Schneider Electric, in 2013. Cambridge-headquartered Aveva merged with Schneider Electric Software in 2018.