Cognizant Leverages IIHT’s Cloud Labs for Training and Development Success Download Case study
About
IIHT (Indian Institute of Hardware Technology) has been providing learning and development solutions to enterprises for the past 30 years. We offer comprehensive learning experience platforms and cloud labs for corporate training and assessments across tech stacks, helping organizations to effectively train and upskill their workforce to keep them engaged and competent.
IIHT has been associated with Cognizant for over a decade, initially providing skill-based requirements for lateral resources. As our customized cloud lab offering stabilised and went into production, we began providing labs for a wide range of Cognizant’s skill and training initiatives, catering to almost 90% of their requirements through a superior product, and not to forget, and hyper-personalised offerings.
" Earlier, Cognizant used vendor labs that presented several challenges with respect to ad hoc requests, timely provisioning, and scalability. It wasn’t long before they discovered IIHT’s cutting-edge cloud labs solution, enabling them to significantly transform their employee training and assessment activities.
" To address the shortcomings that Cognizant faced with vendor labs, we introduced our own cloud labs solution that helped Cognizant rapidly scale their training and assessment initiatives. IIHT’s cloud labs also offered GitHub access to help trainees save and analyse code after assessments for future use.
The Background - Cognizant's experience with cloud lab providers
Initially, Cognizant predominantly used labs offered by vendors for their training and development initiatives. It wasn’t long before these vendor labs started facing steep challenges with ad hoc requests. They faced considerable difficulty in keeping up and ensuring timely delivery.
With the intent to address these shortcomings of vendor labs and develop a superior product, we at IIHT introduced our own –MakeMyLabs – a pre and self-provisioned cloud lab portal. Cognizant was almost immediately impressed with the offering impressed with the offering as it helped them scale their employee training and assessment activities.
" Our flexibility in addressing their lab needs with cost-effective and highly personalized solutions helped us to land Cognizant as our first customer on an enterprise model engagement.
Key Aspects of the Solution Implementation Journey
The solution journey began with IIHT providing pre-provisioned labs for designated users with lab setups configured for their respective technologies.
Cognizant purchased IIHT’s MakeMyLabs portal for regular training, hands-on assessments, and software testing which also provided GitHub access to associates, enabling them to save code for future evaluation after hands-on assessments. We also offered Cognizant a private cloud lab while also catering to public cloud labs (AWS/Azure/GCP) at differently agreed slabs. Even labs like AS400 and Mainframes, were added to Cognizant’s catalogue.
In essence,
- Cognizant became the 1st customer to come onboard when the MakeMyLabs portal went live. They found these las more convenient and secure thanks to the SSO enablement.
- Cognizant initially had access to a meagre 3-4 labs for their training and assessment activities. We expanded the exposure to 70 technologies and labs.
- IIHT provided GitHub account access for associates to save code for evaluation after hands-on assessments.
- IIHT offered private cloud labs at a fixed monthly cost for 350 concurrent users per month up, and up to 25000 active VMs yearly.
- For public clouds, IIHT provisioned and delivered the requests received from Cognizant POCs based on the access date mentioned.
- To address access-related concerns during training, IIHT implemented the workspace feature, which was highly accepted by Cognizant.
- The portal underwent successful rounds of revamps, where issues such as admin controls, usage notifications, and report generation were sorted.
The Outcome
By partnering with IIHT, Cognizant has been able to seamlessly conduct various learning, training and assessment activities through MakeMyLabs.
Cognizant has been actively utilizing IIHT’s cloud labs, which offer a seamless learning experience with a wide range of resources and tools.
Most importantly, in recognition of the high-quality service and support provided by IIHT, Cognizant dissolved the contract with their other cloud lab vendors, and recommended MakeMyLabs cloud labs to their other partners and business units, emphasizing the value of this partnership.
This case study highlights the importance of building strong relationships based on trust, quality service, and seamless support to achieve mutual growth and success.
