New Delhi, April 22 (IANS): Cognizant and Microsoft on Monday announced an expanded partnership with the aim of making the tech giant's generative AI (GenAI) and Copilots available to millions of users to transform enterprise business operations, enhance employee experiences, and accelerate cross-industry innovation.

As part of this collaboration, Cognizant purchased 25,000 Microsoft 365 Copilot seats for its associates, along with 500 Sales Copilot seats and 500 Services Copilot seats to improve productivity, streamline workflows and transform customer experiences.

"Generative AI can be a game-changer for virtually every business in every industry, opening up new possibilities for innovation, efficiency and growth," Ravi Kumar S., CEO, Cognizant, said in a statement.

"That’s why we are investing $1 billion in GenAI over the next three years and leading the development of new research to explore its potential for our clients, their employees and end customers," he added.

In addition, Cognizant said that it will work to deploy Microsoft 365 Copilot to a million users within their global 2,000 clients and across 11 industries.

"By combining Cognizant’s industry expertise with Microsoft’s Copilot capabilities, including Copilot for Microsoft 365 and GitHub Copilot -- we will help drive AI adoption and innovation for millions of users across its network," said Judson Althoff, executive VP and chief commercial officer at Microsoft.

According to the company, this partnership has the potential to significantly accelerate AI adoption and innovation in India.

AI is expected to add $450 to $500 billion to India’s GDP by 2025, accounting for 10 per cent of the country’s $5 trillion GDP target, the company mentioned.