Google's gift to India: 1.3 lakh crore AI hub to be set up in Visakhapatnam; largest AI hub outside the US

NEW DELHI: US tech giant Google has announced that it will set up a Rs 1.3 lakh crore (US$15 billion) artificial intelligence (AI) centre and data centre in India. It will be set up in Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh. The announcement was made at the Bharat AI Shakti event organized by Google in Delhi. Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurien said that this is the largest AI hub that Google is building outside the US. The project is being implemented in collaboration with the Adani Group.

1.3 lakh crore will be invested in five years. The Andhra Pradesh government and Google signed a memorandum of understanding. Union ministers Nirmala Sitharaman and Ashwini Vaishnaw, minister of state Nara Lokesh and Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu were also present at the event.

After signing the MoU, Google CEO Sundar Pichai held discussions with Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Pichai posted on X that it was great to speak with PM Narendra Modi to share the plans for the first-ever Google AI hub in Visakhapatnam.

Sharing Pichai's post, the Prime Minister noted that the multi-faceted investment plan, including the gigawatt-scale data centre, with the vision to build a Viksit Bharat. He added that it will also ensure AI for All, delivering cutting-edge tools to the citizens, boosting the digital economy and securing India’s place as a global technology leader.

Largest AI hub outside the US

• Google's AI deployment to become a reality in India
• India's first gigawatt-scale data centre
• Thousands of supercomputers and servers
• Vishakhapatnam to be part of Google's AI data network in 12 countries
• India-US AI-related trade to increase
• AI-based economic and social development to be strengthened
• AI models to be trained