While the US and China dominate innovation in artificial intelligence (AI), the rush to build the physical computing infrastructure needed to train and run AI models is benefiting India, with investments in this area creating tailwinds for a host of ancillary sectors from clean energy, manufacturing of electrical and electronics gear, various high-end support services and real estate, industry executives said.
AI-ready data centres being set up by Indian conglomerates like Reliance Industries and the Adani group, as well as tech giants like Microsoft, Google and Amazon are going beyond individual projects to become anchor investments that attract entire industrial value chains, deepening domestic manufacturing, they said.
Some real estate developers like Lodha Developers have seized the opportunity to set up the utility infrastructure, called powered shells which have all facilities but the IT equipment, for generating a steady stream of annuity income from technology companies that want to lease them.
