The deal, Cognizant’s fourth major acquisition in 18 months, is designed to plug a specific gap in its AI builder strategy: the ability to design, build, and run the physical data centre infrastructure that enterprise AI actually runs on. Cognizant has agreed to acquire Astreya, a San Jose-based IT managed services firm specialising in AI infrastructure and data centre operations, for approximately $600 million, the company confirmed to Reuters. The deal is expected to close in the second quarter of 2026, pending regulatory approvals. The acquisition is the most operationally specific move yet in Cognizant’s AI pivot under CEO Ravi Kumar S, who took the role in January 2023 and has spent the intervening period reshaping the company around what he calls an ‘AI builder strategy’: helping enterprise clients not merely adopt AI tools but architect, deploy, and scale production-grade AI systems.…