The billionaire Ambani bets high on Ia with Colossal Data Center

India Group Reliance invests billions in the construction of the world’s largest data center, driven by AI and renewable energy, placing the country in the epicenter of the digital revolution

Mukesh Ambani’s Relian Group is building what can become the world’s largest data center in India, the latest in a series of global investments to capitalize on growing demand for artificial intelligence services.

According to the Financial Times, the 67 -year -old billionaire is acquiring the powerful AI semiconductors of Nvidia Corp. And setting up a data center in the city of Jamnagar, which should have a total capacity of three gigawatts, according to people familiar with the matter, who asked for anonymity because the details are not public. This would make him much larger than any date center currently.

Ambani is joining a growing group of technology companies such as Microsoft Corp., Alphabet Inc. and Amazon.com Inc., who are investing billions of dollars on data centers to offer AI to clients around the world. This week, OpenAi, Softbank Group Corp. and Oracle Corp. They promised to invest from $ 100 billion to US $ 500 billion in USA infrastructure in the US through a new entity called Project Stargate.

Still, AMBANI’s project, if done as planned, stands out for its impressive size. The largest data centers in operation today have less than 1 gigawatt, according to data from the DC Byte market intelligence company, which would make it several times larger than the market.

Data Centers’ ability is often measured in Megawatts (millions of watts) of electricity that the site can provide servers, cooling systems and other equipment. The higher the number, the greater the volume of computing operations it can withstand. And AI models are notoriously intensive in computing.

Ambani built his reputation with aggressive business tactics, including relentless entry into the telecommunications sector that made prices plummeted and led several competitors to bankruptcy. His manual looks similar in the field of AI, and he said he will offer extremely low rates to what is known as inference, or operation of models like those who feed chatgPT. Inference costs can be heavy for companies such as OpenAi and local startups as they need to pay for computing resources every time a user makes an appointment.

Reliance executives did not respond to several requests for comment.

It is unclear as AMBANI will finance the project, which can cost from $ 20 billion to US $ 30 billion, based on regional costs for such facilities. Reliance Industries Ltd., the group’s main entity, has the equivalent of about $ 26 billion on its balance sheet.

Jamnagar installation would substantially increase India’s date centers, currently estimated at less than 1 gigawatt. This size would give the country more populous in the world the potential to significantly accelerate its development in artificial intelligence.

Jamnagar, a city with more than 650,000 inhabitants, is located in the state of Gujarat, homeland of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and Ambani himself has family roots in the state. It is the center of the Petroleum and Petrochemicals refining complex of Reliance, the largest in the world.

The city is becoming increasingly central to conglomerate plans, which include a boost in renewable energy. The reliance said it is building a gigantic green energy complex spread for 5,000 acres, with factories to produce photovoltaic panels, fuel cell systems, green hydrogen, energy storage and wind turbines.

Reliance aims to feed the new data center as much as possible with renewable energy, the sources said. It will be close to projects of the Reliance in progress group that will produce solar, wind and green hydrogen, according to one of the people.

However, it is virtually impossible to provide a continuous and reliable flow of solar and wind energy without more consistent resources, such as nuclear reactors, fossil fuel-powered plants or extraordinarily large battery systems to support them. Reliance, whose roots are in oil products, may need fossil fuels to support their data centers.

The world’s largest data centers are currently located in the US and belong to technology giants. The installation of Microsoft in Boydton, Virginia is the largest, with capacity of almost 600 megawatts and another 112 megawatts under construction, followed by Google and Meta Platforms Inc. operations, according to DC Byte.

OpenAi, Softbank and Oracle have not specified the size of the data centers that will build as part of the Stargate effort. Sam Altman, CEO of OpenAi, suggested the idea of ​​building 5 gigawatts facilities, but it is unclear if they are underway.

Ambani has already talked about his plans to reduce prices in AI.

“By taking advantage of our expertise in infrastructure, network, operations, software and data, and by collaborating with our global partners, our goal is to create the lowest Cost of AI inference in India,” said Ambani last year at the meeting annual shareholders of the company. “This will make AI applications in India more affordable than anywhere else, making AI accessible to everyone.”

Demand for data -equipped data centers to host AI workloads should fire with the emergence of Generative AI, the type of AI that generates command -based content – such as OpenAi’s chatgpt. Experts predict an imminent crisis of capacity as companies adopt chatbots and general AI tools to streamline work and increase productivity.

Global demand for data centers may more than triple by 2030, reaching an annual level of 219 gigawatts, according to McKinsey & Co. Consulting. A significant supply deficit is forming, with the US probably facing a shortage of 15 Gigawatts of capacity by 2030, the consultancy said, requiring an expansion of at least twice the data centers capacity built since 2000.