The logo of the Adani Group is seen on the facade of its Corporate House on the outskirts of Ahmedabad, India, November 21, 2024.
Amit Dave | Reuters
India’s Adani on Tuesday announced plans to invest $100 billion to develop renewable energy-powered AI-ready data centers by 2035, seeking to establish the world’s largest integrated data center platform.
The blockbuster investment, which comes as India pushes to gain a stronger foothold in the global AI race, is expected to create a $250 billion AI infrastructure ecosystem in India over the next decade, Adani said.
The initiative is also poised to incentivize an additional $150 billion in spending across server manufacturing, sovereign cloud platforms, and supporting industries, the company said.
“The world is entering an Intelligence Revolution more profound than any previous Industrial Revolution,” Gautam Adani, chairman of Adani Group, said in a statement.
“India will not be a mere consumer in the AI age. We will be the creators, the builders and the exporters of intelligence and we are proud to be able to participate in that future,” he added.
The announcement coincides with India’s AI Impact Summit, a five-day event which got underway on Monday.
Global leaders and technology executives such as OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai are expected to take part in the summit, which has been billed as the first major international AI meeting hosted in the Global South.
Shares of Adani Enterprises, the flagship company of Adani Group, rose 2.3% on the news, making it one of the top gainers on the benchmark Nifty 50 stock index. Shares of Adani Green Energy were last seen up 1.8%.
Strategic partnership
Adani’s AI push is designed to build on AdaniConnex’s existing 2 gigawatt (GW) national data center, with plans to expand toward a 5 GW target. It is this deployment that the company says will create the world’s largest integrated data center platform.
AdaniConnex is a joint venture between Adani Group and EdgeConnex, a global data center provider.
Adani said its vision is supported by its strategic partnerships with Google. The multinational conglomerate added that it was also in talks with other major players to establish large-scale campuses across India, without providing further details.
Google’s parent company Alphabet said in October that it would invest $15 billion over the next five years to build an AI data center hub in southern India.
Shares of Adani Group companies have been volatile in recent weeks.
Indeed, the firm’s stocks fell sharply after court filings late last month showed that the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission is looking to send a summons to Indian billionaire and Adani Group chair Gautam Adani and nephew Sagar Adani on charges of bribery and fraud.
Adani’s chariman was indicted with seven other men in New York federal court in November 2024 on charges related to a massive bribery and fraud scheme. CNBC reached out to Adani Group and the U.S. SEC following the news.
India’s Ministry of Law and Justice twice refused last year to deliver the summons to Gautam Adani and Sagar Adani under the Hague Convention, the SEC told the court.
— CNBC’s Priyanka Salve contributed to this report.
