Cognizant Research Shows Plug-and-Play AI is a Myth

Rhea-AI Summary

Cognizant (Nasdaq: CTSH) published research on March 10, 2026 finding that enterprises prefer custom, full‑stack "AI Builder" IT services over plug‑and‑play AI. The study of 600 AI decision makers and 38 executives highlights operational barriers, sustained AI budgets, and trust in services firms to scale AI into business operations.

Key metrics: 63% report gaps between ambitions and capabilities; 84% maintain formal AI budgets; 52% invest $10M+ annually; IT services hold a 23% trust advantage over consultancies.

Positive

• 84% of enterprises maintain formal AI budgets
• 91% expect AI budgets to grow in next two years
• 52% invest $10M or more annually in AI
• IT services show a 23% trust advantage over consultancies

Negative

• 63% report moderate-to-large capability gaps versus AI ambitions
• 33% cite regulatory and compliance challenges to scaling AI
• 31% struggle to demonstrate ROI from AI investments
• 27% report talent shortages and 27% report inadequate data readiness

News Market Reaction – CTSH

-2.58%

1 alert

-2.58% News Effect

On the day this news was published, CTSH declined 2.58%, reflecting a moderate negative market reaction.

Data tracked by StockTitan Argus on the day of publication.

Key Figures

AI decision makers: 600 Executive interviews: 38 Ambition-capability gap: 63% +5 more

8 metrics

AI decision makers 600 Quantitative study sample size in Cognizant research

Executive interviews 38 Qualitative interviews with senior executives

Ambition-capability gap 63% Enterprises reporting moderate-to-large gaps in AI capabilities

Formal AI budgets 84% Enterprises maintaining formal AI budgets

Growing AI budgets 91% Enterprises expecting AI budgets to grow in 2 years

Double-digit budget growth 50% Enterprises anticipating double-digit AI budget increases

Annual AI spend $10M Threshold; 52% investing this amount or more annually

Trust advantage 23% Trust edge IT services firms have over management consultancies in AI adoption

Market Reality Check

Price: $62.43 Vol: Volume 5,230,025 is below...

low vol

$62.43 Last Close

Volume Volume 5,230,025 is below the 8,995,682 20-day average, suggesting a quieter session. low

Technical Trading below the 200-day MA of 74.73 and about 25.72% under the 52-week high.

Peers on Argus

CTSH fell 2.43% while close peers were mixed: FIS +0.62%, WIT +0.87%, LDOS +1.33...

1 Down

CTSH fell 2.43% while close peers were mixed: FIS +0.62%, WIT +0.87%, LDOS +1.33%, CDW +0.13%, and BR -2.47%. Momentum scanners only flagged IT at -4.22%, reinforcing a stock-specific tone rather than a broad sector move.

Previous AI Reports

5 past events · Latest: Feb 24 (Positive)

Same Type Pattern 5 events

Date	Event	Sentiment	Move	Catalyst
Feb 24	AI services win	Positive	-0.1%	Multi-year AI-driven workplace services partnership with major vehicle manufacturer.
Feb 02	AI partnership	Positive	+1.0%	Strategic partnership with Uniphore to build domain-specific enterprise AI solutions.
Jan 30	AI collaboration	Positive	-0.5%	Expanded global collaboration with Adobe to operationalize generative AI at scale.
Jan 26	Marketing AI deal	Positive	+1.7%	Strategic partnership with Typeface to modernize enterprise marketing via agentic AI.
Jan 15	AI research report	Positive	-2.2%	Publication of major report quantifying AI’s potential U.S. labor productivity impact.

Pattern Detected

Recent AI-tagged announcements have generally been positive in tone but produced mixed share reactions, with three instances of price declines and two advances, yielding an average move of 0%.

Recent Company History

Over the last few months, Cognizant has released a series of AI-focused updates, including strategic partnerships with Uniphore, Adobe, and Typeface, and a major research report estimating AI’s impact on U.S. labor productivity at $4.5 trillion. These events emphasize domain-specific AI, agentic AI orchestration, and enterprise-scale deployments. Price reactions to these AI announcements have been small and mixed, with moves between about -2.17% and +1.7%. Today’s research on "AI Builders" continues this theme of positioning Cognizant as an AI services leader rather than marking a new financial inflection point.

Historical Comparison

+0.0% avg move · In recent months, CTSH has issued multiple AI-related updates with an average move of 0%. Today’s AI...

AI

+0.0%

Average Historical Move AI

In recent months, CTSH has issued multiple AI-related updates with an average move of 0%. Today’s AI research on "AI Builders" fits this pattern of strategic AI messaging with historically modest, mixed price reactions.

AI-tagged news has progressed from broad productivity research to successive strategic partnerships and client wins, positioning Cognizant’s AI Builder approach across marketing, workplace services, and domain-specific enterprise use cases.

Market Pulse Summary

This announcement highlights Cognizant’s research-backed case for bespoke "AI Builder" services, emp...

Analysis

This announcement highlights Cognizant’s research-backed case for bespoke "AI Builder" services, emphasizing that 63% of enterprises see sizable gaps between AI ambition and capability and that 91% expect AI budgets to grow. In the recent past, multiple AI-tagged updates have focused on partnerships and domain-specific solutions with mixed share reactions. Investors tracking this story may watch for follow-on news that ties this positioning to concrete contracts, implementation milestones, and measurable enterprise value for clients.

Key Terms

ai builder, agentic ai, generative ai, saas providers

4 terms

ai builder technical

"such as "AI Builder" firms, a new services model defined by designing"

An AI builder is a software platform or toolkit that lets developers and non-experts create, train and deploy artificial intelligence models or smart applications using pre-built components, visual workflows and simplified controls. It matters to investors because these tools can cut development time and costs, increase a company’s ability to automate tasks and launch new products, and therefore accelerate revenue growth or improve profit margins—like giving businesses a ready-made kitchen to cook complex recipes faster.

agentic ai technical

"while agentic and generative AI systems are advancing rapidly, organizations"

Agentic AI refers to computer systems that can make their own decisions and take actions without needing someone to tell them what to do each time. It's like giving a robot a degree of independence to solve problems or achieve goals on its own, which matters because it could change how we work and interact with technology in everyday life.

generative ai technical

"while agentic and generative AI systems are advancing rapidly, organizations"

Generative AI is a type of computer technology that can create new content, like text, images, or music, on its own. It’s important because it can produce realistic and useful material quickly, which could change how we create art, write stories, or even develop new products. Think of it as a smart robot that can invent and produce things almost like a human.

saas providers technical

"ahead of SaaS providers, cloud providers, AI model companies, AI"

SaaS providers are companies that deliver software over the internet on a subscription basis, like renting a streaming service for business tools instead of installing them on each computer. For investors, they matter because subscription payments create steady, predictable revenue and allow rapid scale, but performance hinges on keeping customers and controlling churn—metrics that reveal growth potential, profit margins and long-term value.

AI-generated analysis. Not financial advice.

TEANECK, N.J., March 10, 2026 /PRNewswire/ -- Cognizant (Nasdaq: CTSH) released new research showing that companies pursuing AI adoption overwhelmingly prefer IT services firms - such as "AI Builder" firms, a new services model defined by designing and building custom, full stack AI solutions - to deliver real enterprise value from AI.

The research, based on a quantitative study of 600 AI decision makers and qualitative interviews with 38 senior executives, finds that organizations rank custom solutions and flexible engagement models as the most important factor when selecting an AI partner, ahead of pricing and time to value. Pricing and proven AI case studies remain important, but rank below capabilities that enable AI to be embedded directly into business operations and value chains.

At the same time, enterprises cite generic, off-the-shelf AI solutions as a leading reason to reject an AI provider, along with lack of industry-specific expertise, inability to integrate into existing technology stacks, and inadequate support and maintenance. According to the research, the top three challenges organizations face in enterprise AI adoption are regulatory and compliance concerns, difficulty demonstrating return on investment and lack of clear AI strategy and vision.

"AI success is not about deploying isolated models—it's about engineering intelligence into the enterprise with purpose-built solutions," said Ravi Kumar S, CEO of Cognizant. "The most trusted path to an AI future is working with an AI Builder—one that brings deep industry context, systems engineering expertise, and operational accountability. At Cognizant, we focus on building the bridge from AI experimentation to measurable enterprise value."

Key findings from the study include:

Enterprises face a "messy middle" in scaling AI: AI builders can create the bridge to enterprise value -- solving complex, real-world problems:

• 63% of enterprises report moderate-to-large gaps between their AI ambitions and current capabilities.
• The biggest barriers to scaling AI are operational and organizational:
  • 33% cite regulatory and compliance challenges
  • 31% struggle to demonstrate ROI
  • 27% report shortages in talent
  • 27% report inadequate data readiness

AI investment is long term, not experimental: Enterprises are committing sustained capital to AI, signaling long-term infrastructure building rather than speculative investment:

• 84% of enterprises maintain formal AI budgets
• 91% expect AI budgets to grow in the next two years
• 50% anticipate double-digit increases in AI budgets over the next two years
• 52% are already investing $10M or more annually on AI initiatives

AI is augmenting human workforces, not replacing them: Enterprise leaders are not forecasting workforce collapse, they're forecasting redesign of workflows for human-AI collaboration.

• Across 13 enterprise functions, the highest expected level of full automation is only 20% (in sales)
• Even in customer service, where 76% of leaders expect workflows to become AI-dominant, only 9% believe they will be fully automated.

In qualitative interviews conducted as part of the research, enterprise leaders said "out‑of‑the‑box" AI is inadequate; they want tailored solutions AI builders can develop and tune.

A Vice President in the UK banking sector shared, "A lot of vendors come in thinking that the off-the-shelf solutions they have would fit our needs, but often enough they find that that's not the case. And it takes them a number of years, more than they planned, and a lot of money, both from us … to get those software working. And these are not just AI software."

A US-based insurance industry CIO stated, "It depends on where I'm inserting this particular ingredient in our value. And so sometimes I want a builder and an engineer, sometimes I want an integrator, sometimes I want an activator. Because they're playing more of a coordinating function—a weaving, stitching-together  function."

Together, these research insights underscore a clear shift in enterprise expectations: from experimenting with AI tools to partnering with AI Builders that can design, build, integrate, and operate AI systems at scale— in alignment with client governance, security, and risk‑management frameworks and with lasting business impact.

These findings align with recent remarks by Babak Hodjat, Chief AI Officer at Cognizant, who noted that enterprises are far from being able to rely on AI "out of the box." In interviews with Fortune and Reuters, Hodjat emphasized that while agentic and generative AI systems are advancing rapidly, organizations still need significant help engineering, integrating, governing, and operating these systems in ways that support client safety, reliability and governance requirements within complex enterprise environments.

AI decision makers rated IT services firms like AI builders highest in their ability to assist with their AI adoption (ahead of SaaS providers, cloud providers, AI model companies, AI startups and management consultancies). The research also finds that IT services firms are trusted across the AI adoption lifecycle—especially in ongoing management of AI-enabled systems, but also in AI strategy, custom AI solution development, increasing organizational productivity and scaling AI across the enterprise. IT services firms have a 23% trust advantage over management consultancies in AI adoption. While management consultancies benefit from strong brand recognition, they are seen as less credible in hands-on AI implementation.

About the Research
Cognizant's research findings are based on quantitative research conducted in November 2025 with 600 AI decision makers, and qualitative interviews conducted in October 2025 with 38 business and technology leaders in the United States, Germany, Singapore and Australia with AI decision making responsibility. The full report can be found here: How ai is reshaping business & empowering workforces | Cognizant

About Cognizant
Cognizant (NASDAQ: CTSH) is an AI builder and technology services provider, building the bridge between AI investment and enterprise value by building full-stack AI solutions for our clients. Our deep industry, process and engineering expertise enables us to build an organization's unique context into technology systems that amplify human potential, realize tangible returns and keep global enterprises ahead in a fast-changing world. See how at www.cognizant.com or @cognizant.

For more information, contact:

U.S.
Name: Gabrielle Gugliocciello
Email: gabrielle.gugliocciello@cognizant.com 

Europe / APAC
Name: Sarah Douglas
Email: sarah.douglas@cognizant.com 

India
Name: Vipin Nair
Email: Vipin.Nair@cognizant.com

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SOURCE Cognizant

FAQ

What did Cognizant (CTSH) research find about enterprises preferring AI Builder firms on March 10, 2026?

Enterprises prefer custom AI Builder IT services for embedding AI into operations rather than off‑the‑shelf tools. According to Cognizant, surveyed decision makers ranked custom solutions, flexible engagement, and systems engineering expertise above pricing and speed to value.

How common are formal AI budgets among enterprises, per Cognizant's March 10, 2026 research (CTSH)?

Formal AI budgets are widespread, not experimental. According to Cognizant, 84% of enterprises report maintaining formal AI budgets and most expect continued budget growth over the next two years.

What operational barriers to AI scaling did Cognizant identify that could affect CTSH clients?

Operational barriers include regulatory, ROI demonstration, talent, and data readiness issues. According to Cognizant, 33% cited compliance challenges, 31% cited ROI difficulties, and 27% cited both talent shortages and inadequate data readiness.

How does Cognizant's research quantify enterprise investment levels in AI relevant to CTSH?

Many enterprises are investing materially in AI infrastructure long‑term. According to Cognizant, 52% are already investing $10M or more annually, and 50% anticipate double‑digit budget increases in two years.

Why do enterprises reportedly reject off‑the‑shelf AI providers, according to Cognizant (CTSH)?

Enterprises reject generic AI due to lack of industry expertise, integration issues, and poor support. According to Cognizant, organizations frequently prefer builders who can tailor, integrate, and operate AI within existing tech stacks and governance frameworks.

What advantage do IT services firms have over management consultancies in AI adoption per Cognizant's findings?

IT services firms are seen as more credible for hands‑on implementation and ongoing management. According to Cognizant, IT services hold a 23% trust advantage over management consultancies across the AI adoption lifecycle.