India’s Adani Group announced on Tuesday that it intends to commit $100 billion by 2035 to build “hyperscale AI-ready data centres”, reinforcing New Delhi’s ambition to position itself as a global hub for artificial intelligence.
The declaration coincides with India hosting a five-day international AI summit, where discussions will cover topics ranging from employment disruption to child safety.
The summit is expected to bring together 20 national leaders and 45 ministerial-level delegations, with the main events scheduled for Thursday. Prominent technology executives, including Sam Altman of OpenAI and Google’s Sundar Pichai, will also be in attendance.
In a statement, the Adani Group said the $100 billion commitment is expected to trigger an additional $150 billion in investments across “server manufacturing, advanced electrical infrastructure, sovereign cloud platforms and supporting industries”.
“Together, this is projected to create a $250 billion AI infrastructure ecosystem in India over the decade,” the statement noted.
The diversified conglomerate, with interests spanning ports to power generation, said its strategy is “anchored” on major collaborations with Google — which plans to develop a large data centre campus in the coastal city of Visakhapatnam — and Microsoft.
“The Adani Group is also in discussion with other major players seeking to establish large scale campuses across India thereby further cementing its position as India’s premier AI infrastructure partner,” the statement added.
Last year, India moved up to third position — surpassing South Korea and Japan — in a global AI competitiveness ranking compiled by Stanford University researchers.
However, analysts caution that despite ambitious infrastructure plans and innovation goals, India still faces significant challenges before it can compete at the same level as the United States and China.