Cognizant yesterday formally opened a new Collaboratory lab in London, after Amsterdam its second in Europe. The new interactive work space brings together a multi-disciplinary team of social scientists, design thinkers, creative technologists, engineers, and strategists to help organisations transform and reimagine their business, operating, and technology models for the digital era.
“We have learned that success in the digital economy means reimagining products and experiences at speed and scale, but just as important, beginning that innovation process with a clear understanding of customer behaviour,” said Sanjiv Gossain, Senior Vice President and Head of Cognizant’s Digital Business in Europe.
The new arm will showcase new technologies such as Internet of Things and Industry 4.0 and in action, provide a manufacturing space for prototyping, offer tools for creation and collaboration, and includes configurable work spaces for technology-led innovation. The Collaboratory further provides the firm’s clients with access to the end-to-end managed innovation offerings of Cognizant Digital Business – the firm’s unit that blends strategy and design services with human insight and analytics.
Gossain added, “Our Collaboratory in London combines human-centric design with digital technologies to enable clients to deliver engaging new experiences for their customers. Cognizant integrates these elements in a space designed to encourage fresh thinking and collaboration as we innovate and co-create securely and quickly to shorten the time-to-value.”
The London location, based in Paddington, is Cognizant’s second Collaboratory in Europe, and fourth globally, following earlier openings in Amsterdam, New York, and Melbourne (opened in November last year). The Collaboratory network further builds on Cognizant’s wider digital labs infrastructure, which has more than a dozen hubs around the globe, including in Barcelona, Spain; Toronto, Canada; Rapperswil, Switzerland; and Boulder, United States.
Among the customers Cognizant serves in the digital domain are Barclays, Centrica, Walmart and Etihad (e.g. digitisation of guest experience) – the firm helps them according to Gossain with moving their business from just “doing digital” to “being digital.”
Commenting on the news, Michael Versace, Global Research Director at independent market intelligence and advisory firm IDC, remarked, “Across all industries, businesses today are operating in a fast-changing market environment fuelled by many digital trends, where agility and accelerated innovation cycles are key to survival and future success. We view Cognizant’s expanding network of Collaboratory facilities as a new client engagement platform for digital innovation, addressing an important need today of both business and technology executives.”