Google’s AI bet on India signals new digital sovereignty era

India with its 1.4 billion strong population is undoubtedly at the forefront of global artificial intelligence (AI) wave. Interestingly, the country has emerged as one of the fast adopters of AI apps and platforms in the world. In the words of Sam Altman, if there is one large society in the world that seems most enthusiastic to transform with AI right now, it’s India.

No wonder, global AI platforms have seen one of the largest downloads in India. ChatGPT has its largest user base in India and the company has come up with special pricing model for the country. As AI adoption grows, the demand for data centre is growing manifold. Against this backdrop, Google’s mega plan to invest around $15 billion for building an AI hub at Visakhapatnam is a welcome move.

It shows the world’s largest search engine Google is betting heavily on India, which remains one of the fastest growing markets in the world. Google’s strategic move also reflects that the company senses rising demand for sovereign AI infrastructure across many nations and India in particular.

Many nations currently are taking protectionistmeasures in order to give restricted entry for AI-led innovations. For instance, the US has put restrictions over accessof high-powered Nvidia chips to China. China is trying to restrict access of rare earth minerals- one of the key inputs for battery, chips and defence equipment- for the US, India and other emerging economies. Both the US and Europe are not keen free movement of technology talent from India and other developing nations to these geographies.

Moreover, this technology superiority is being used to dictate foreign policy direction of countries. For instance, Microsoft temporarily cut access to its cloud services for Nayara Energy in July 2025 to comply with European Union sanctions against Russia. Though the access was restored after sometime, it gave the hint that what the US-headquartered technology giants can do in case relationship between India & the US deteriorates.

So, Google’s plan to invest heavily in data centre business by building an AI hub at Visakhapatnam is a step in the right direction. It will ensure that all-critical digital infra is situated in Indian territory. Indian users’ data will stay within nation’s limits. Importantly, India has woken up to the reality of technology sovereignty after a long time. Now, several ministries have adopted platforms of Zoho in order to make India less dependent on foreign platforms like Microsoft.

Similarly, the country is actively exploring options to build its own operating platform, browser and related digital stack. The country has already shown that it can not only build digital stack but also can scale it real fast. UPI is one of the pioneering examples of what India can achieve in terms of payment ecosystem. It has substantially reduced India’s dependence on foreign payment platforms like Visa and Mastercard.

The country needs to replicate the same in other fields of digital applications. As India builds its own digital stack, it will prompt global technology giants to take several steps for ensuring India’s digital sovereignty as seen in Google’s case.