The shares of leading IT sector firms rose on Thursday after firms showed strong expectations for the coming quarters.

Cognizant Technology Solutions Corp recorded an increase of 18 per cent in revenues during the first quarter from January to March, 2013 and said that it expects higher revenue than expected by the market analysts in the current quarter.

NASDAQ-listed Cognizant has acquired Germany-based consulting & IT services provider C1 Group's six companies that focus on three segments, viz. energy & utilities, manufacturing & logistics and financial services.

Without disclosing the price of the deal, Cognizant said that the deal would provide it with highly experienced domain, process and technology experts who have profound knowledge in delivering multifarious systems integration projects.

Teaneck, N. J.-based information technology services firm Cognizant is widely expected to report a growth of at least 16 per cent in 2013.

In a filing with the Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC), Nasdaq-listed Cognizant said its senior executives would get 100 per cent of their performance-related stock units only if the firm hits a revenue target of $8.52 billion.

Cognizant Technology Solutions has lifted up its realty infrastructure expansion in the Indian market by around $200 million.

The US-based tech firm, which has large offshore attendance in the Indian market, has reviewed its investment proposal to a total of $700 million in realty from 2011 through 2015.

This is to swell its campuses in the country by an extra 10.5 million sq ft.

According to a new report by global research firm, the top five Indian IT services providers have recorded a growth of 23.8 per cent in the previous year compared to 7.7 per cent growth recorded by the overall global IT services market.

The top five firms including TCS, Infosys, Wipro, HCL Technologies and Cognizant grew higher than the industry average indicates India's strong hold on the It services market. Cognizant, which is listed on Nasdaq, recorded 33.3 per cent growth in revenues during the year while TCS revenue grew by 29.4 per cent in 2011 as compared to 0.9 per cent in 2010.

Revenues grew 7.7%QoQ, higher than other large Indian IT vendors. Pricing witnessed positive surprise, onsite and offshore pricing grew 1.5%QoQ and 2%QoQ respectively.

Strong revenue growth, stable operating margins: Cognizant reported revenue growth of 7.7%QoQ (45.2%YoY) to USD1,311mn for Q4CY10, outperforming its guidance of USD1,270mn. This was led by strong volume and a positive surprise in pricing. Net income surged 43.2%YoY to USD206mn (1.2%QoQ).

Revenues surge 10%QoQ to USD1,217mn, outperforming its guidance by 3.6%. Full year revenue guidance for CY10 revised upwards yet again; 39%YoY growth to USD4.55bn.

Strong sequential growth despite a stellar performance in Q2CY10: Cognizant reported revenue growth of 10.1%QoQ (42.6%YoY) to USD1,217mn for Q3CY10, outperforming its guidance
of USD1,175mn. These growth rates are despite having a stellar performance of 15%QoQ growth for Q2CY10. This includes pent-up demand for IT services which appears to come to and end in
this quarter, according to the management.

IT solutions company, Cognizant Technology Solutions Corporation has announced a 22 per cent jump in its net profit to end at $172.2 million for the second quarter ending June 30. Last year the profit stood at $141.3 million.

During the same period, the revenues were up by 42 per cent to end at $1.105 billion, a rise of 15 per cent over the previous year.

Nasdaq-listed India's leading IT firm Cognizant has declared that it is going to acquire PIPC Group. The deal has been finalized and it is in its final step. PIPC Group is the leading management consulting firm of UK. The acquisition of this London based firm will make Cognizant more expert in the program management.

Now a day the program management has become a vital part of operations for the IT companies. They do need this for signing up complex, multi-million dollar contracts. This deal is undoubtedly come up as a positive move for the Indian IT firm.

Infosys technologies, Cognizant technology solutions and UST Global, the three IT firms of India have collectively bagged multi year contracts worth $600 million, from the Wal-Mart stores Inc, World's largest retailer.

It was the end of the year 2007 when Wal-Mart has started dealing with the leading software vendors including Oracle, HP and SAP for the packaged retail applications.

Chennai, Oct 15 : The Nasdaq-listed software services firm Cognizant Technology Thursday announced it would acquire Hyderabad-based UBS India Service Centre, the captive service provider to the UBS Group for an undisclosed sum.

As part of the multi-year agreement, Cognizant will provide a range of services relating to business process outsourcing (BPO), knowledge process outsourcing, information technology and remote infrastructure management to UBS divisions around the globe.    

UBS India Service Centre currently employs about 2,000 people.