Kathmandu. India’s Reliance Group has pledged to invest $11 billion to build a giant artificial intelligence (AI) hub in Andhra Pradesh’s Visakhapatnam city in partnership with Canadian and US partners. The state government has made this information public on Wednesday.

The project, which is expected to be completed in five years, will include building a large artificial intelligence (AI) center with a capacity of one gigawatt. In the same city, Google recently announced plans to build a $15 billion data center and AI infrastructure, its largest project outside the United States.

The investment will be a joint venture between Reliance, Canada-based Brookfield and US-based Digital Realty. Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. “This investment will give further impetus to jobs, development of new technologies and attracting world-class investment,” Naidu said in a social media post. ”

The project will position Andhra Pradesh as a major hub for advanced digital infrastructure and future high-performance computing technologies, according to a statement issued by the state government. The demand for AI technology in India has increased rapidly, and by the end of this year, it is expected that the internet users will be close to nine billion.

The demand for such centers is growing rapidly across the globe due to the increasing digital data storage and the operation of energy-efficient AI systems. At the same time, major US-based AI companies are also constantly announcing plans to expand and invest in India.

In October, AI company Anthropic said it would open an office in India next year, and its chief Dario Amodei met Prime Minister Narendra Modi. OpenAI has also announced that it will set up an office in India this year. According to Sam Altman, the head of the organization, the use of ChatGPT in India has quadrupled compared to last year.

In July, the AI company Pacplexity announced a partnership with Indian telecom company Airtel to provide free premium service to 360 million users for one year.