Indian billionaire Mukesh Ambani’s conglomerate is to plow as much as 10 trillion rupees (US$110 billion) over seven years into artificial intelligence (AI)-related infrastructure, joining the global rush into technology’s fastest-growing arena.
This investment by Reliance Industries Ltd and its telecom unit, Reliance Jio Infocomm Ltd, will also seek to lower the cost of AI, Ambani said at the India AI Impact Summit on Thursday in New Delhi.
“India cannot afford to rent intelligence. Therefore, we will reduce the cost of intelligence as dramatically as we did the cost of data,” Ambani said at the event, referring to Reliance Jio’s disruptive entry in 2016 with cheap data and free calls that recast the sector’s price dynamics.
Photo: Bloomberg
The announcement by Asia’s richest person follows a US$100 billion AI investment pledge by compatriot Gautam Adani earlier this week and Tata Group’s plans to partner with OpenAI Inc earlier in the day.
India’s largest conglomerates — long known for aligning their corporate strategy to national priorities — are doubling down as Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government pitches India as a hub for AI and cloud computing.
India held one of the largest AI conferences this week that has already drawn industry heavyweights, including Alphabet Inc CEO Sundar Pichai and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. The country expects to attract more than US$200 billion in AI-driven investments over the next two years, mirroring the global trend where trillions are being spent in an unprecedented AI hardware arms race.
“We will prove that AI doesn’t take away jobs. Rather it will create new high-skill opportunities,” Ambani said, assuaging widespread fears that the advent of the AI era will displace workers.
Reliance will work with India’s leading industrial groups to embed AI across manufacturing, logistics, energy, finance, retail, agriculture and healthcare, he added.
Reliance also sketched out other areas in which it is adopting AI. Its JioHotstar plans to introduce a bot based on OpenAI ’s ChatGPT that will recommend content and interact with viewers in multiple local languages on India’s largest streaming platform, according to a separate statement.
The billionaire has bet big on this sector since at least 2024 when he told shareholders that Reliance will aim to provide AI at affordable prices to Indians. In that marathon two-hour speech, he had mentioned AI more than 80 times.
That vision is now taking concrete shape. In November last year, Digital Connexion, a joint venture between Reliance Industries, Brookfield Asset Management Ltd and Digital Realty Trust Inc signed a pact to invest US$11 billion by 2030 to develop a data center in southern India.
Reliance has also begun construction of several data centers in Jamnagar in Gujarat that will house several gigawatts of computing capacity, according to Ambani. Over 120 megawatts of that will come online in the second half of this year.
“This is not a speculative investment for chasing valuation,” he said yesterday about the latest announcement. “This is patient, disciplined, nation building capital.”
Tata Group and its tech services arm, Tata Consultancy Services Ltd (TCS), are partnering with OpenAI in India on AI technologies, including data center infrastructure that could become one of the largest in the country.
One pillar of the agreement will be TCS’ development of a 100 megawatt data center that could be expanded to 1 gigawatt. A 1GW data center typically costs US$35 billion to US$50 billion.
TCS and OpenAI plan to team up to build what are known as agentic solutions for specific industries. Such AI services are able to operate autonomously in certain circumstances, limiting the need for human intervention.
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