New Delhi, Oct 14 (PTI) In its biggest ever investment in India, tech giant Google on Tuesday said it will invest USD 15 billion in building an AI infrastructure hub in Andhra Pradesh, which would include a gigawatt-scale data centre in partnership with Adani Group.

The project is expected to create 5,000–6,000 direct jobs and 20,000–30,000 total jobs in Andhra Pradesh.

The AI hub at Visakhapatnam will be Google's largest outside the US and will include a data centre fuelled by clean energy and a fiber-optic network. Business tycoon Gautam Adani said his company AdaniConneX would partner with Google on the project, along with Bharti Airtel, India's second largest mobile operator.

The USD 15 billion will be invested over the next five years (2026-2030).

"It's the largest AI hub that we are going to be investing in anywhere in the world outside of the US," Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian said at an event here to sign the formal agreement.

Google joins a growing list of US tech giants ramping up investments in India amid the country's accelerating AI boom. Amazon.com Inc has announced plans to invest USD 12.7 billion in cloud infrastructure by 2030, while OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, is preparing to establish a 1-gigawatt data centre in the region.

Microsoft is also expanding its data centre footprint in India, a key growth market with nearly a billion internet users. Billionaires Gautam Adani and Mukesh Ambani have similarly announced significant investments to boost data centre capacity in the country.

Analysts project India's data centre market to top USD 100 billion by 2027.

While Google has committed to spend about USD 85 billion this year to build out data centre capacity worldwide, the one planned at Visakhapatnam will have an initial capacity of 1 gigawatt (GW).

In the Visakhapatnam hub, Adani Group and Airtel have partnered with Google to build the infrastructure for its new project, which also includes construction of a new international subsea gateway.

The rapid advancement of AI, which demands massive computing power, is fuelling the need for high-performance data centres that connect thousands of chips into powerful computing clusters.

Commenting on the announcement, Prime Minister Narendra Modi in a post on X said the multi-faceted investment "aligns with our vision to build a Viksit Bharat. It will be a powerful force in democratizing technology. It will also ensure AI for All, delivering cutting-edge tools to our citizens, boosting our digital economy and securing India’s place as a global technology leader!" He made the comment in reply to Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai's post on his conversation with Modi to share Google's plans for the first-ever Google AI hub in Visakhapatnam.

Calling it a "landmark development", Pichai said, "This hub combines gigawatt-scale compute capacity, a new international subsea gateway, and large-scale energy infrastructure. Through it we will bring our industry-leading technology to enterprises and users in India, accelerating AI innovation and driving growth across the country." Andhra Pradesh's IT Minister Nara Lokesh said the state is aiming to host 6 GW of data centre capacity by 2029-30. The Visakhapatnam data centre alone represented an investment of more than USD 10 billion from Google and its partners.

Separately, Adani Enterprises, the flagship firm of Gautam Adani's conglomerate said its joint venture AdaniConneX, and Google will develop India's largest AI data centre campus and new green energy infrastructure in Visakhapatnam.

Google's AI hub in Visakhapatnam is a multi-faceted investment of approximately USD 15 billion over five years (2026-2030). "It will be brought to life in close collaboration with ecosystem partners including AdaniConneX and Airtel," the company said in a statement.

It however did not indicate the investment in the data centre.

The project will see co-investment in new transmission lines, clean energy generation and innovative energy storage systems in Andhra Pradesh.

"A monumental day for India! This facility will house the TPU and GPU-based compute power required for deep learning, neural network training, and large-scale AI model inference and create an ecosystem that accelerates AI-driven solutions for India's most critical sectors - from healthcare and agriculture to logistics and finance.

"We are honoured to be building the engine to power India's AI revolution, providing the tools for our nation's brightest minds to solve complex challenges," said Gautam Adani, Chairman of Adani Group, in a post on X.

An analysis commissioned by Google suggests that the AI hub is expected to generate at least USD 15 billion over five years (2026-2030) in American gross domestic product because of new economic activity from increased cloud and AI adoption, as well as the American talent and resources involved in developing and operating the AI hub.

Appreciating Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Naidu, Sitharaman said he in his earlier stints has shown what he can do to scale up digital infrastructure.

Electronics and IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw lauded the Andhra Pradesh government for giving speedy approvals for Google's investment in the state.

Lokesh said data is the new oil and data centres are new refineries. PTI PRS ANK ANZ ANU ANU