Lakshmi Narayanan (born 1953) is the ex-vice chairman and ex- CEO of

Cognizant Cognizant is an American multinational information technology services and consulting company. It is headquartered in Teaneck, New Jersey, United States. Cognizant is part of the NASDAQ-100 and trades under CTSH. It was founded as an in-hous ...

and former Chairman of

ICT Academy ICT Academy is an initiative of the Government of India in collaboration with the state governments and industries. ICT Academy is a not-for-profit society, and a joint venture under the public-private partnership (PPP) model. ICT Academy was st ...

. He was the CEO and president of

until 2006.

Biography

He has played a leading role in the global

information technology Information technology (IT) is the use of computers to create, process, store, retrieve, and exchange all kinds of Data (computing), data . and information. IT forms part of information and communications technology (ICT). An information te ...

industry for more than 25 years, managing divisions and business units in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located entirel ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

and the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

. Since joining Cognizant Technologies in 1994, he has been instrumental in formulating the company's strategy and building and managing the organization's development centers in India, where he is based. A member of Cognizant's Board of Directors, Narayanan spends time traveling extensively in the U.S. and Europe to meet clients. He also served as Chairman on

NASSCOM The National Association of Software and Service Companies (NASSCOM) is an Indian non-governmental trade association and advocacy group, focused mainly on the technology industry of India. Established in 1988, NASSCOM is a non-profit organis ...

(National Association of Software and Service Companies) in 2007–08. Narayanan began his career at

Tata Consultancy Services Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) is an Indian multinational information technology (IT) services and consulting company with its headquarters in Mumbai. It is a part of the Tata Group and operates in 150 locations across 46 countries. In July ...

, growing through the ranks from

developer Developer may refer to: Computers * Software developer, a person or organization who develop programs/applications * Video game developer, a person or business involved in video game development, the process of designing and creating games * Web d ...

, to technologist, to program manager, to business leader. He was a regional head of Tata Consultancy Services in India when he joined Cognizant as CTO. He holds a BSc and MS in science and electronics from Bangalore University (

University Visvesvaraya College of Engineering University of Visvesvaraya College of Engineering (UVCE) was established in 1917, under the name Government Engineering College, by Bharat Ratna Sir M. Visvesvaraya. It is the fifth engineering college to be established in the country and first ...

) and an PG Diploma from the

PSG College of Technology PSG College of Technology is an autonomous, government aided, private engineering college in Coimbatore, India. It is affiliated with Anna University. It is affiliated to PSG and Sons Charities Trust. Among engineering colleges in India, PS ...

, Coimbatore. He was also on the board of the

National Skill Development Corporation National Skill Development Corporation (NSDC) is a not-for-profit public limited company incorporated on July 31, 2008, under section 25 of the Companies Act, 1956 (corresponding to section 8 of the Companies Act, 2013). NSDC was set up by Min ...

, as a representative of

. Narayanan was awarded the

Dataquest ''Dataquest'' is an Indian magazine focused on information technology related articles. The magazine is published monthly by Cyber Media India Ltd, South Asia South Asia is the southern subregion of Asia, which is defined in both geogr ...

IT Person of the Year 2008 by the CyberMedia group's IT publication, ''Dataquest''.

References

Living people 1953 births {{India-business-bio-stub