Cognizant Plans To Buy Fellow Microsoft Partner Of The Year 3Cloud

Judson Althoff, Microsoft’s newly promoted CEO of its commercial business, says the deal ‘will create one of the most capable and credentialed partners in the Azure ecosystem.’

Cognizant, No. 7 on CRN’s 2025 Solution Provider 500, plans to buy repeat Microsoft partner of the year winner 3Cloud by the close of the first quarter of 2026.

Teaneck, N.J.-based Cognizant will add 3Cloud’s 1,000-plus Azure experts and engineers and 1,500-plus Microsoft certifications to its capabilities, according to a statement Thursday. The companies did not disclose financial terms for the deal. 3Cloud is also an Elite Databricks partner.

“This acquisition marks a pivotal step in Cognizant’s strategy to empower our clients for the future of enterprise AI,” Cognizant CEO Ravi Kumar S said in a statement. “3Cloud’s deep Azure expertise, industry-aligned approach and longstanding Microsoft partnership will enable us to deliver even greater value to our clients as they accelerate their AI journeys. Together, we are poised to set a new standard for innovation and impact in the Azure ecosystem.”

Cognizant Eyes 3Cloud

Mike Rocco, CEO of Downers Grove, Ill.-based 3Cloud, said in a statement that joining Cognizant adds greater global scale to the enterprise AI readiness, cloud and data work the solution provider is known for.

“We look forward to shaping the future of intelligent business together,” said Rocco (pictured).

CRN has reached out to Cognizant and 3Cloud for additional comments. Cognizant has almost 20,000 Azure-certified associates globally, according to the statement.

The news comes just a day after private equity-backed 3Cloud won Microsoft’s 2025 Americas Channel U.S. Partner of the Year award. The awards were announced just as Microsoft heads into its annual Ignite conference aimed at its 500,000-member ecosystem. The conference runs Monday to Friday in San Francisco.

Cognizant also walked away with plenty of Microsoft partner accolades, with the Redmond, Wash.-based technology giant naming Cognizant its 2025 Intelligent Automation Partner of the Year, Americas System Integrator Partner of the Year, U.S. SI Partner of the Year and GitHub AI Services Partner of the Year.

Cognizant In Growth Mode

Cognizant reported its latest quarterly results on Oct. 29. The solution provider saw $5.42 billion in revenue in the third fiscal quarter, ended Sept. 30. That’s an increase year on year of 6.5 percent and 2.8 percent quarter on quarter ignoring foreign exchange. Its adjusted operating margin of 16 percent marked an increase of 70 basis points year over year.

Total headcount was 349,800, up 6,000 people from June 30 and 9,700 from Sept. 30, 2024.

The solution provider said to expect fourth quarter revenue between $5.27 billion and $5.33 billion, up between 2.5 percent and 3.5 percent year on year ignoring foreign exchange. It expects full-year revenue between $21.05 billion and $21.10 billion, up 6 percent to 6.3 percent year on year.

Full-year 2025 adjusted operating margin should be about 15.7 percent, marking 40 basis points of expansion, according to Cognizant.

The quarter exceeded Wall Street’s expectations and marked the fifth straight quarter of positive organic growth, investment firm William Blair said in a report on the quarterly earnings. The firm said Cognizant looks like it is stabilizing and laying the foundation for accelerated revenue growth, but warned that the economy is putting pressure on discretionary enterprise spending.

Cognizant’s recent acquisitions include ServiceNow-focused solution provider Thirdera and enterprise resource planning (ERP) consulting firm Belcan, both in 2024.

3Cloud Founded By Microsoft GM

Rocco co-founded 3Cloud in 2016 after about 16 years with Microsoft, leaving as a regional general manager of corporate accounts. In this role, he was accountable for $1 billion in revenue from 1,000 enterprise and upper mid-market clients across 18 central U.S. states, according to his LinkedIn account.

San Francisco-based private equity firm Gryphon Investors first invested in 3Cloud in 2020. The deal marked Gryphon’s first technology services investment. Today, the firm has more than $10 billion of assets under management.

Since then, 3Cloud has delivered 20 percent organic compound annual growth and expects more than 20 percent growth in 2025, according to Thursday’s statement. Acquisitions along the way have included buying the consulting arm of Pragmatic Works in 2020 and acquisition of Microsoft Azure data and AI services partner DesignMind in March.

Gryphon portfolio companies include IT services firms Caylent and NewRocket plus technology vendors phData and Rootstock.

Judson Althoff, Microsoft’s newly promoted CEO of its commercial business, said in a statement that “Cognizant’s acquisition of 3Cloud will create one of the most capable and credentialed partners in the Azure ecosystem.”

“We are excited by the potential this acquisition brings to our mutual customers, enabling them to harness the power of Azure and AI to drive business innovation at scale,” Althoff said.

Microsoft reported in October that Azure and other cloud services saw a 39 percent increase in revenue year on year in its latest fiscal quarter.

3Cloud’s Partner of the Year award comes after it delivered 2,570 unique Azure projects in the past year, 3Cloud said in a statement. The projects ranged from unifying enterprise data estates to accelerating application and artificial intelligence capability adoption. Financial services, retail and health care are some of 3Cloud’s main industry verticals.

Prior awards for 3Cloud include 2024’s Microsoft Americas Partner of the Year award for health and life sciences and 2023 U.S. Partner of the Year for Azure Analytics.

Cognizant’s stock was about flat toward market close Thursday, trading at about $74 a share.

Other solution provider acquisition announcements this year include Accenture buying Systema, 26North Partners buying AVI-SPL and Entech buying LAN Infotech.