Google Invests $15bn To Build The Biggest AI Hub In India

Google Invests $15bn To Build The Biggest AI Hub In India

Alphabet, the parent company of Google, plans to invest $15 billion (£11.29 billion) to construct an AI data hub in the Andhra Pradesh state in southern India.

The facility will be a component of Google’s global network of AI centres located in 12 countries, and it will be situated in the port city of Visakhapatnam.

“It’s the largest AI hub that we are going to be investing in anywhere in the world, outside of the United States,” Thomas Kurian, the CEO of Google Cloud, said at an event in the capital Delhi on Tuesday, adding that the investment will be spread over the next five years.

US President Donald Trump has been urging American businesses to prioritise domestic investment at the time of the announcement.

India has been a popular location for AI data centres. The nation has become a hotspot for cloud and AI expansion for tech companies due to its cheap data prices and quickly expanding internet user base.

Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai said the facility “will bring our industry-leading technology to enterprises and users in India, accelerating AI innovation and driving growth across the country”.

A formal agreement to finalise the project will be signed on Tuesday, the Andhra Pradesh government said.

“It is a massive leap for our state’s digital future, innovation, and global standing,” said the state’s technology minister Nara Lokesh.

The project will include renewable energy technologies, an enlarged fiber-optic network, and cloud and AI infrastructure.

According to Bloomberg News, the project is a component of the Andhra Pradesh government’s aim to build 6GW of data centre capacity by 2029.

Data centres are actual buildings that contain the networking and computer hardware used by businesses to gather, process, store, and share data.

They include the power and cooling systems required to run servers, storage systems, and network hardware such as firewalls and routers.

The government of Andhra Pradesh has been luring international investors with land and electricity subsidies.

The global professional services firm JLL’s India Data Centre Market Dynamics 2024 research states that the country’s data centre business has expanded quickly over the last five years, nearly tripling its 2019 level and surpassing the 1GW capacity mark in 2024.