TCS’ Obsession with Generative AI

“With over 100,000 GenAI-ready employees today, we are now investing in deepening their expertise further with the exciting new technology,” said TCS executive vice president and global head – human resource, Milind Lakkad, at the recent earnings call. 

TCS, the IT giant was catching up with generative AI, but now it has gone all-in on AI in the last couple of months. In May, the company announced that it is developing a ChatGPT-like tool for generating code using in-house algorithms. This would be followed by integration of the tool in MasterCraft, the low-code software development platform. 

The recent Q2 report highlights the firm's further commitments for generative AI with the launch of AI.Cloud. This unit brings together TCS' three hyperscale-dedicated cloud units and specialists in data sciences and AI/ML. TCS mentions that they are a launch partner for hyperscalers in multiple new technology launches, including generative AI.

Strengthening partners and clients

CEO K Krithivasan mentioned, "Our robust pipeline of opportunities, coupled with the integration of generative AI solutions, plays a pivotal role in securing significant contracts." He further emphasised that generative AI remains a central topic in discussions with IT and business leaders across various markets, where they actively engage in co-innovation and experiment with new Proof of Concepts (PoCs) and innovative ideas.

The IT giant has been partnering with cloud providers like Google and Microsoft for providing generative AI services for its customers. Recently, TCS has decided to strengthen its partnership with Microsoft to develop AI-based software services. The collaboration with Azure OpenAI, formed by Microsoft and OpenAI, involves using the cloud-based AI tool GitHub Copilot.

In May, TCS also announced that it is partnering with Google to offer its cloud generative AI services, Vertex AI, for its Model Garden and offering solutions for its customers. 

Furthermore, TCS Interactive, which provides digital interactive services, experienced strong growth driven by clients' investments in experience-led transformation initiatives and marketing effectiveness, with significant experimentation with generative AI-enabled customer experiences. This indicates that TCS is actively using generative AI to enhance customer experiences and marketing strategies, reflecting the practical applications of this technology.

The financial report also mentions that TCS is partnering with a leading electricity distributor AEMO in APAC to deploy a secure enterprise generative AI platform on Azure to respond to user queries on health and safety relating to electrical equipment. This demonstrates the practical implementation of generative AI in addressing safety and operational concerns in specific industries.

Krithivasan said that they won six large operating model transformation deals with TCS Cognix at their core. TCS Cognix embeds AI, machine learning, and increasingly generative AI, to enable business outcomes and decision-making via dashboards and predictive analytics. 

The best part is Krithivasan also said that TCS is now seeing a progressive increase in the complexity and sophistication of generative AI use cases, including augmentation solutions for financial advisors and wealth management strategies, automated underwriting for insurance policies, AI-lead molecule discovery, as well as engineering design space explorations for automotive and gas turbines.  

Training and hiring employees

Apart from its investment in generative AI, TCS is one of the rare IT leaders which is ready to hire more people, instead of laying them off like the others. It has announced its plans to hire around 35,000-40,000 freshers in FY24, just as it does every year. 

TCS COO, NG Subramaniam said, “We usually hire between 35,000 to 40,000 people and those plans are intact.” Additionally, the company wants to train the hires and reduce the bench size. TCS is focusing on improving the utilisation of its employees amid the slowdown in the sector. “All these people were going through training, induction, and upskilling in the last 12 months. They’re available as a productive pool to be deployed into various projects,” Subramaniam added. 

TCS announced in July its plans to significantly scale its Azure OpenAI expertise and plans to get 25,000 associates trained and certified on Azure OpenAI to help clients accelerate their adoption.

TCS has also launched an AI playground, where its employees can now safely and securely access various generative AI platforms and a curated set of startup technologies from their COIN, or Co-Innovation Network partner, experiment with large language models, alongside trying out new ideas and building out solutions to real-life business problems without exposing data in their network.

“Over time, we plan to hold hackathons in the playground, throwing challenges for TCS’ best and brightest to identify the most talented engineers within the organisation and further our talent,” said Krithivasan, saying that their various product and platform teams are working towards leveraging generative AI to create differentiating capabilities in their respective products.