Cognizant appoints Infosys’ Rajesh Varrier as global head of operations and C&MD India

IT major Cognizant has announced the appointment of Rajesh Varrier as global head of operations and India Chairman & Managing Director after the resignation of Rajesh Nambiar, who is set to become Nasscom president.

Nasscom announced the appointment of Nambiar as its president-designate. She will succeed Debjani Ghosh after she completes her term in November 2024. Nambiar was previously a member of the Nasscom Executive Council before being elected chairperson in 2023.

In a release, Cognizant said Varrier's responsibilities will include operations, delivery excellence, workforce planning, India leadership council, expansion and other key responsibilities.

“Cognizant today announced the appointment of Rajesh Varrier as Global Head of Operations, effective September 2, 2024. Additionally, he will be appointed as Chairman & Managing Director, India, assuming the role on October 1, 2024, as Rajesh Nambiar leaves Cognizant to become president of Nasscom,” the company said.

Varrier will be an executive vice president of Cognizant, reporting to Ravi Kumar S, Cognizant's chief executive officer.

Before joining Cognizant, Varrier served as EVP, Head of Global Services and Infosys Americas, and Global Head of Infosys' Digital and Microsoft businesses.

He also served as SVP of Digital Experience for the Microsoft business at Infosys. Before joining Infosys, Varrier was the CIO and Digital officer for Aditya Birla Sun Life Insurance and founder of the analytics firm Activecubes.

He holds an undergraduate degree in Physics and a post-graduate degree in Computer Engineering from the University of Mumbai.

“Nambiar is an industry leader having worked and led global teams at TCS, IBM, Ciena and Cognizant. His leadership and strategic initiatives have been instrumental in positioning India’s tech sector as a global lead,” Nasscom said.

The Nasscom release quoted Nambiar as saying: “This is truly an exciting time for the industry, as we focus on the accelerated transition to AI-first companies, making talent our greatest competitive advantage, driving growth, and increasing investments in IP creation and R&D. I am both privileged and honoured to take on this opportunity to collaborate with all stakeholders to enhance the Indian tech sector’s capabilities.”

Debjani Ghosh, current president of Nasscom, observed that the tech sector is pivotal to India’s growth and added that the IT industry association has played a key role in shaping India’s tech leadership globally.

“Leadership at Nasscom is fully empowered to carry forward the charter and I am confident that Rajesh will elevate it to even greater heights. I welcome him and look forward to working with him,” she said.

Nasscom had appointed a search committee to appoint the next president. The committee was headed by Keshav R. Murugesh, Group CEO, WNS, and members included Harish Mehta, Som Mittal, Krishnakumar Natarajan and Sindhu Gangadharan, PTI reported.

(With inputs from PTI)