In a boost to India’s artificial intelligence and semiconductor chip ambitions, global chip design major NVIDIA and local oil-to-telecom conglomerate Reliance Industries on September 8 announced a partnership to develop an indigenous foundation large language model trained on the nation’s diverse languages and tailored for generative AI applications.
The two companies will work together to build AI infrastructure that is over an order of magnitude more powerful than the fastest supercomputer in India today.
While NVIDIA will provide access to its most advanced chips and AI supercomputing service in the cloud, execution and implementation will be managed by Reliance Jio, which has extensive offerings and experience across mobile telephony, 5G spectrum, fibre networks and more.
The Al infrastructure will be hosted in AI-ready computing data centres that will eventually expand to 2,000 MW.
“We are delighted to partner with Reliance to build state-of-the-art AI supercomputers in India,” said Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of NVIDIA.
“India has scale, data and talent. With the most advanced AI computing infrastructure, Reliance can build its own large language models that power generative AI applications made in India, for the people of India,” he added.
Jio’s collaboration with NVIDIA also aligns with the local conglomerate’s strategy of serving as a large, comprehensive digital, cloud and networking platform for both consumers and business customers.
“As India advances from a country of data proliferation to creating technology infrastructure for widespread and accelerated growth, computing and technology super centres like the one we envisage with NVIDIA will provide the catalytic growth just like Jio did to our nation’s digital march,” said Mukesh Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director, Reliance Industries. “I am delighted with the partnership with NVIDIA and looking forward to a purposeful journey together.
“At Jio, we are committed to fueling India’s technology renaissance by democratizing access to cutting-edge technologies, and our collaboration with NVIDIA is a significant step in this direction,” said Akash Ambani, chairman of Reliance Jio Infocomm. “Together, we will develop a state-of-the-art AI cloud infrastructure that is secure, sustainable and deeply relevant across India, accelerating the nation’s journey towards becoming an AI powerhouse.”