Cognizant said that it has been selected by Zurich Germany, the German subsidiary of Zurich Insurance Group, as a strategic IT partner for transforming the general insurance application landscape.

As part of a multi-year deal, Cognizant will enable the insurer to deliver more digital services offerings to its partners and clients.

The American IT company said that it shall closely work with Zurich Germany for simplifying, modernising, and managing and maintaining the enterprise application landscape of the latter in the general insurance domain.

The partnership, which will form joint DevOps teams, is designed to extend the artificial intelligence (AI), data, software engineering, and cloud capabilities of the Zurich subsidiary.

It will bring together the applications of Zurich Germany in its general insurance domain under the co-management of inhouse IT and Cognizant. With this, the insurer is hoped to bring down the total cost of ownership, accelerate the time to market of new digital products and services, and build the base for greater digital and agile enablement of the enterprise.

Zurich Germany chief information officer Jens Becker said: “Zurich is on an ongoing journey of ‘accelerated digital evolution’ to meet the rapidly changing needs of our customers and partners and creating a more intimate connection with them.

“Cognizant has proven itself as a knowledgeable and reliable strategic partner, and we look forward to further capitalising on its industry expertise to help us advance our digital transformation.”

The new deal between the parties is said to build on and considerably expands their existing agreement, under which Cognizant implemented and manages and maintains the general insurance products of Zurich on Guidewire.

Cognizant Germany, Austria and Switzerland head Rolf Werner said: “Innovative, forward-thinking clients like Zurich understand the importance of collaborating with a strategic IT partner to help them achieve their digital transformation and meet their business objectives.

“Cognizant is pleased to have been selected by Zurich to expand our successful collaboration, and we will apply our deep expertise in application modernisation, development and maintenance, along with our in-depth knowledge of the insurance industry, to deliver even more value and help Zurich meet its customers’ needs.”

Earlier this month, the American IT firm won a multi-year contract from India’s National Insurance Company Limited (NICL) to accelerate and help manage the latter’s digital transformation.