After a gap of seven quarters, Cognizant raced ahead of Capgemini in terms of number of employees during the September quarter. The reason for the same is that Cognizant’s attrition rate during the period at 16.2% was lesser than Capgemini’s 18.6%. Last year, Cognizant’s attrition rate was 30-31% whereas Capgemini’s was around 27-28%.
Cognizant used to have a larger headcount than Capgemini before the March quarter of FY22. In the March quarter of FY22, Capgemini reported a marginally higher number of employees at 340,700 vis-a-vis Cognizant’s 340,400.
Capgemini’s offshore headcount dropped by 14,600 in the last one year, and its onshore headcount dropped by 1,100 in the same period. Cognizant’s headcount on the other hand, dropped by just 2,800 year-on-year. Cognizant has in fact added about 1,000 employees in the third quarter.
Carole Ferrand, CFO, Capgemini, in the earnings call, said, “In the past quarters, after two years of intensive hiring and higher attrition, our priority for 2023 was to regain efficiency and optimise our talent base, especially in offshore locations. Finally, as anticipated, attrition has continued to cool down at 18.6% on the last 12-month basis, attrition is now within our nominal operating ranges”.
