Altman hails India's AI potential; Reliance, ITC announce AI-related plans in WB

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, who once questioned India's capacity to develop large-scale Artificial Intelligence (AI) models, now advocates for the country's leadership in AI. At an event in New Delhi with Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, Altman noted India's expanding role in AI, revealing it as OpenAI’s second-largest global market.

This shift in Altman's view coincides with India's plans to launch its own AI model soon. Vaishnaw recently shared that the country is creating a safe, secure, and cost-effective indigenous AI model as part of the IndiaAI mission, which aims to address the specific needs of India, including support for multiple languages.

To facilitate AI development, the government has established a high-performance computing infrastructure, starting with 10,000 GPUs, with an additional 8,693 GPUs on the way. This will make AI computing power accessible to researchers, developers, and students at a fraction of the cost of global models.

Altman acknowledged the high costs of AI development but emphasized its significant long-term economic potential, stating that while training AI models remains expensive, it is increasingly feasible for countries like India.

Meanwhile, Mukesh Ambani and Sanjiv Puri unveiled ambitious AI initiatives for West Bengal. At the Bengal Global Business Summit 2025, Ambani announced Reliance Industries would double its investment in the state to ₹1 lakh crore by the decade's end, creating 100,000 jobs. He highlighted Reliance's commitment to Bengal's economic growth, noting investments have surged 20-fold in less than a decade.

Ambani stated, "Jio is building the world's best infrastructure in India, essential for transforming the nation into a deep tech powerhouse." He positioned Jio as the leading digital services and data provider globally.

ITC Ltd also announced the opening of a global AI center near Kolkata, inaugurated virtually by West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee. 

Meanwhile, entrepreneur Bhavish Aggarwal is investing $230 million into his AI startup Krutrim, which focuses on developing large language models for Indian languages. He aims to raise a total of $1.15 billion by next year and plans to build India’s largest supercomputer in partnership with Nvidia while making Krutrim's AI models open source.

According to a Boston Consulting Group (BCG) survey from November, India's AI market is expected to reach $17 billion by 2027, growing at a CAGR of 25-35%. The demand for AI talent is projected to grow at a CAGR of 15%, with India having the second-largest installed AI talent base of 420,000 employees. BCG also reported that 80% of firms prioritize AI as a core strategic focus, surpassing the global average of 75%.