New Delhi: Billionaire Mukesh Ambani on Friday launched Reliance Intelligence, a wholly-owned arm of Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), promising artificial intelligence (AI) “everywhere and for every Indian”.
The new AI business, the promoter of the $208-billion conglomerate stressed, may have “just as large, if not larger” impact on the group’s future, just as its venture in the mobile internet-driven digital services did a decade ago.
Speaking at the company’s 48th annual general meeting in Mumbai, Ambani announced the launch of Reliance Intelligence with a paid-up capital of ₹1 crore. Simultaneously, the company announced the expansion of its partnerships with its existing shareholders—Google and Meta Platforms—for AI applications and services. The two Big Tech companies hold 7.73% and 9.99% stakes in Ambani’s Jio Platforms Ltd—formed in 2016 and driven in revenue primarily by the telecom operator, Reliance Jio.
For its AI venture, Ambani underlined “four clear missions”, which included setting up gigawatt-scale data centres in Jamnagar, Gujarat. The other three missions included striking partnerships with global tech firms, building consumer- and industry-facing AI applications, and building a base of employees working on AI that would include “world-class researchers, engineers, designers and product builders.”
Reliance Intelligence’s partnership with Google will specifically cater to the company’s claim to build large-scale data centres, which industry stakeholders said is imperative as India remained underserved in terms of net data centre capacity. Meanwhile, through RIL, the partnership with Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta will see the two companies jointly invest $100 million to build an open-source AI platform-as-a-service for businesses. Reliance will hold the majority share of this venture, at 70%.
“AI is already at the heart of Reliance’s transformation into a deep-tech enterprise… A decade ago, digital services became a new growth engine for Reliance. Now, the opportunity before us with AI is just as large, if not larger. Jio promised and delivered digital everywhere and for every Indian. Similarly, Reliance Intelligence promises to deliver AI everywhere for every Indian,” Ambani, chairman of RIL, said about the new venture. “With Reliance Intelligence and our strong partnerships, green infrastructure, and India-first governance, we are building for the next decade with confidence and ambition.”
Ambani’s renewed push into artificial intelligence comes just two-and-a-half years after ChatGPT turned generative AI into a part of everyday conversation.
Since then, companies have been working to understand how to modify and adapt AI to their digital transformation goals. Consumers, meanwhile, are seeing an increasing barrage of AI features that include image editors, proofreaders and even education assistants—such as Silicon Valley starlet OpenAI striking education partnerships with Indian government bodies.
Industry consultants said that even though AI and mobile internet are fundamentally different propositions, Reliance’s push is likely to help generative AI applications proliferate among mainstream users in the country. However, even guest speeches from Google chief Sundar Pichai alongside Meta’s Zuckerberg, as well as the announcement of Jio’s public listing plan by the first half of the next calendar year, failed to enthuse investors. On Friday, shares of RIL settled 2.2% lower at ₹1,357 apiece on the BSE.
But, the company’s AI foray was largely greeted positively.
“The data centre move is a much-required one. The US has over 51 megawatt (MW) of per-capita data centre capacity, while India’s capacity stands only at 1MW. While a large amount of data centre capacity is being built by India right now, the market currently remains underserved,” said Kashyap Kompella, an AI and technology consultant. “On this note, the first part of Reliance’s AI missions is on-point. The second part is where Reliance already has unprecedented scale, and would be capable of integrating AI into its services at scale, is in applications—here, building for India-specific languages and use cases will likely see consideration reception going forward,” Kompella said.
Jayanth Kolla, co-founder and partner at technology consulting firm Convergence Catalyst, said that Reliance’s AI push “is akin to Apple’s push for ‘Intelligence’ by adding a layer of AI to its services.”
“The key to understand here is that every global AI firm is focusing on India to build scale. For example, Perplexity announced its partnership with Bharti Airtel in order to find an increasing usage scale in the country. This is where Reliance partnering with Google and Meta in AI would be akin to an Indian industrial conglomerate signing up Microsoft’s Windows and the Linux platforms as partners and stakeholders—back in the pre-internet computer proliferation era,” Kolla added.
However, a third senior consultant, who requested anonymity due to conflict of interest, said that the quantum of investment floated as part of Reliance Intelligence shows a tentative approach—and not an all-out acceleration in AI from the oil-to-data conglomerate.
“The data centres investment from Reliance is commendable, but most of it will likely go in-house. But, as far as its partnership with Meta is concerned, it’s interesting to note that Zuckerberg is offering multiple times higher annual salaries to AI engineers in Silicon Valley, than the $30 million it will be investing with Reliance. This likely shows a tentative approach, because even Meta itself is losing the kind of early dominance it had in open-source generative AI to begin with,” the consultant added.
