Cognizant to hire over 20,0000 'digitally ready' graduates from campuses; to hike salaries to Rs 4 lakh

American multinational corporation Cognizant Technology Solutions is expected to increase the intake of technical graduates this year through campus recruitment. Cognizant plans to recruit more than 20,000 technical students from campuses in the country this year said a report in Mint quoting company’s chief executive officer (CEO) Brian Humphries. “With more and more university students becoming digitally ready, we have decided on a 30 percent increase in our hiring of engineering and science graduates for 2020," Humphries was quoted as saying in the report. [caption id=“attachment_4409095” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Cognizant. Pic courtesy: Reuters.[/caption] The IT major is expected to hike the annual campus salaries for engineering graduates by 18 percent to Rs 4 lakh, said the report. On last Friday, the Teaneck-headquartered company opened a new facility in Mangaluru, expanding its presence in Karnataka, reported PTI. Located in the heart of the city, the new 100,000 sq-ft facility can accommodate more than 1,100 employees, the NASDAQ-listed company said. Cognizant has had an association with Mangaluru since 2011 when it acquired CoreLogic Global Services Private Limited (CoreLogic India), the India-based captive operations of CoreLogic, one of the largest real estate information and analytics provider in the US market. The company currently employs more than 600 professionals in Mangaluru, more than 50 percent of whom are women. In Karnataka, Cognizant also has operations in Bengaluru and Mysuru. The company has more than 28,000 professionals in Bengaluru and nearly 700 professionals in Mysuru. In December last year, Cognizant had hinted that it might lay off about 350 senior-level employees whose salary package is in the range between Rs 80 lakh and Rs 1.2 crore as part of the company’s efforts to reduce costs besides its aggressive plan to shift focus more to digital technology-led services from traditional business. In November 2019, Cognizant had said it would slash up to 7,000 jobs in the next few months as part of a cost reduction programme. The US-based company was expected to remove about 10,000-12,000 mid-to-senior level associates worldwide from their current roles in coming quarters, it said. The gross reduction is expected to lead to a net reduction of approximately 5,000 to 7,000 roles (about 2 percent of its total headcount) and re-skilling and redeployment of about 5,000 of the total associates impacted. In May last year, reports said that Cognizant might hand out over 18 percent higher pay packages to entry-level engineers joining in 2020. Engineering students graduating in June 2020 would see the offer made by the US-based company increase from Rs 3.38 lakh per annum to Rs 4 lakh. According to placement officers, Cognizant usually hires about 15,000-20,000 freshers on an average every year. The entry-level annual salary for graduate engineers is currently around Rs 3.30-3.60 lakh. — With PTI inputs