TCS renews its partnership with Marks and Spencer in aftermath of major 2025 cyber attack

Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) has announced the renewal of its multi-year partnership with Marks & Spencer (M&S). The deal will see TCS continue to serve as M&S’s strategic technology partner as the retailer pushes ahead with its digital transformation efforts.

Sacha Berendji, Operations Director, Marks and Spencer, says: “Technology transformation is a key strategic priority for M&S as we invest for growth. Having the right suite of partners, with access to the latest developments in AI and digital expertise is imperative. I am pleased that we are extending our partnership with TCS, who will work alongside our in-house team as we accelerate our digital transformation.”

Krishnan Ramanujam, President - Consumer Business Group, Tata Consultancy Services, comments: “M&S is a highly cherished and iconic British brand, that has always been at the forefront of retail innovation. We are proud of our long standing partnership and delighted to be chosen to support its enterprise transformation.”

“Our strong contextual knowledge of its business helped lead the digital wave for M&S. As it now accelerates its technology transformation we look forward to bringing our enterprise scale AI capabilities, deep retail expertise, and engineering leadership to create sustained value, business agility, and a future ready retail enterprise.”

Hitting back

Last year, The Telegraph published an article entitled 'M&S ousts Indian outsourcer accused of £300m cyber attack failures'.

Marks and Spencer had, it noted, not renewed a deal with TCS to run its tech helpdesk.

The article closely followed on from the Indian provider conducting an internal investigation over being the origin of a cyber attack that hit the UK retailer’s systems at a cost of hundreds of millions of pounds.

And it caused something of a stir at TCS.

“TCS provides a number of technology and IT services for M&S and we value our partnership with the TCS team,” M&S said in a statement. “Regarding the IT service desk contract specifically, as is usual process, we went to market to test for the most suitable product available, ran a thorough process and instructed a new provider this summer.”

Meanwhile, TCS had its PR peeps contact RTIH with a spokesperson telling us: "The report published by The Telegraph is misleading, with several inaccuracies including the size of the contract and the continuity of TCS’ work for M&S.”

They added: “As both M&S and TCS have clarified, the service desk contract with M&S followed a regular competitive RFP process initiated in January 2025, with M&S opting to proceed with other partners much prior to the cyber incident in April 2025. These matters are hence clearly unrelated. In fact, we continue to work on numerous other areas, in our role as a strategic partner for M&S and are proud of this longstanding partnership.”

“On the cyber incident itself, as previously clarified, TCS conducted a review of our own networks and systems and our conclusion is that the vulnerabilities have not originated from there. TCS does not provide cyber security services to M&S. This is a service that is provided by another partner.”

2026 RTIH Innovation Awards

AI will be a key focus area at the 2026 RTIH Innovation Awards.

The awards are now open for entries and celebrate global retail technology innovation in a fast moving omnichannel world.

Our winners will be revealed at the 2026 RTIH Innovation Awards Ceremony, taking place at The HAC in Central London on Wednesday, 4th November.

Check out our 2025 winners here.

Our 2025 hall of fame entrants were revealed during a sold out event which took place at The HAC on 16th October and consisted of a drinks reception, three course meal, and awards ceremony presided over by award winning comedian, actress and writer Tiff Stevenson.

In his welcome speech, Scott Thompson, Founder and Editor, RTIH, said: “This is the awards’ fifth year as a physical event. We started off with just 30 people at the South Place Hotel not far from here, then moved to London Bridge Hotel, then The Barbican, and last year RIBA’s HQ in the West End.”

“But I’m conscious of the fact that, to quote the legend that is Taylor Swift, You’re only as hot as your last hit, baby. So, this year we’ve moved to our biggest venue yet, and also pulled in our largest number of entries to date and broken attendance records.”

He added: “This year’s submissions have without doubt been our best yet. To quote one of the judges: The examples of innovative developments across both traditional and digital retail spaces were truly remarkable.”

Congratulations to our winners, and a big thank you to our sponsors, judging panel, the legend that is Tiff Stevenson, and all those who attended our 2025 gathering.