New Delhi: After the deal with Google for establishing a Data Centre hub, Andhra Pradesh is now all set to see another significant AI boost, months after Google announced its AI data centre investment. But this time, Reliance Industries has recently announced that they are going to set up a 1 GW AI-focused data centre in the southern Indian state. This upcoming Reliance facility will be built as a modular unit equipped with the graphics processing units, tensor processing units and other AI processors. It is being especially designed as a counterpart to the company’s data centre in Jamnagar.
Andhra Pradesh has been working to position itself as a significant data centre hub, and has recently signed an agreement with Google. In some of the earlier conversations with some sources, the state IT and electronics minister, Nara Lokesh, has stated that the government is targeting a total of 6 GW in data centre capacity. Andhra Pradesh has recently closed deals of 1 GW with Google and 500 MW with Sify. The addition of the Reliance Industries proposal moves the state closer to its target. In some sources, it has been reported that the agency that the company also plans to set up a 6 GW solar power project to supply energy for the latest data centre.
Reliance Industries executive director PMS Prasad is scheduled to sign an MoU with the chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu on Friday. The agreement will also include the company’s greenfield integrated food park planned at Kurnool across 170 acres. This park will manufacture beverages, packaged drinking water, chocolates, snacks and Atta, a plan Naidu reaffirmed in an interview. These announcements coincide with the CII Partnership Summit being held in the state, during which the government expects to formalise over 400 MoUs with major companies. These include the proposed investments from the Brookfield for Rs 1.08 lakh, ReNew for Rs 82,000 crore, SAEL Industries for Rs 22,000 crore and Hero Future Energies for Rs 15,000 crore, to be signed across Friday and Saturday.
Responding to the concerns about the agreements not materialising into real projects, these MoUs are not on paper. Each investment is genuine and will come into the state within the next three and a half to four years. Naidu has also said that, “I am happy to share that over the last 16 months, my cabinet has cleared investments of up to Rs 9 lakh crore. Over the next two days, we will be signing MoUs for another Rs 9-10 lakh crore. These are all implementable. We will be able to get Rs 20 lakh crore of investments grounded and generate 20 lakh jobs.”
