OpenAI and Tata Group Announce Landmark 1GW AI Data Center Initiative in India

OpenAI and Tata Group Announce Landmark 1GW AI Data Center Initiative in India

OpenAI has entered into a strategic partnership with India’s Tata Group to construct a massive artificial intelligence data center complex, with an initial phase of 100 megawatts (MW) and ambitions to scale to a staggering 1 gigawatt (GW) of dedicated power capacity. The project, if fully realized, would rank among the largest AI infrastructure investments in India and underscore the country’s rising importance in the global AI ecosystem.

According to TechCrunch, the initial phase will focus on deploying 100MW of compute capacity, sufficient to support thousands of high-performance AI training and inference workloads. This first phase is expected to be operational by late 2027, with subsequent expansions contingent on demand and regulatory approvals. The full 1GW target — equivalent to the power consumption of a small city — would position the facility as one of the most energy-intensive AI infrastructure projects outside the United States.

The partnership leverages Tata’s unparalleled infrastructure expertise across energy, telecommunications, and real estate. The Tata Group, one of India’s oldest and most diversified conglomerates, brings extensive experience in managing large-scale power grids, renewable energy integration, and data center operations through its subsidiary Tata Communications. OpenAI, meanwhile, brings its proprietary AI models, massive computational requirements, and global demand for scalable cloud-based AI services.

While Bloomberg reported the partnership’s existence, it did not provide further technical or financial details due to access restrictions. However, industry analysts suggest the project may be partially funded through India’s National Mission on Transformative AI and Quantum Technologies, a government initiative aimed at positioning India as a global AI hub. The data center is expected to be located in one of India’s designated tech corridors — potentially in Gujarat or Telangana — where land, power, and connectivity are optimized for large-scale digital infrastructure.

Notably, this collaboration follows OpenAI’s earlier partnership with AMD to secure next-generation AI chips. The Tata deal extends that supply chain logic into physical infrastructure, creating a vertically integrated AI ecosystem: AMD provides the hardware, OpenAI the software and models, and Tata the scalable, sustainable data center backbone. This tripartite alignment reflects a broader trend among leading AI firms to control more of their infrastructure stack, reducing reliance on public cloud providers like AWS or Google Cloud.

Environmental considerations are central to the project’s design. Sources indicate the facility will incorporate hybrid power solutions, including solar and wind energy, with battery storage systems to mitigate grid strain. Tata has committed to achieving net-zero emissions for the facility by 2035, aligning with India’s broader climate goals. The project is also expected to create over 1,500 direct jobs and thousands of indirect positions in construction, maintenance, and AI operations.

For India, the partnership represents a strategic milestone. With domestic AI startups like Zoho and Mu Sigma gaining traction, and government policies incentivizing local AI development, the Tata-OpenAI project could catalyze a wave of foreign investment in Indian AI infrastructure. It also signals a shift in global AI geography — away from exclusive U.S.-centric dominance toward distributed, multi-continent ecosystems.

As global demand for generative AI surges, the need for high-capacity, low-latency data centers has become critical. OpenAI’s decision to anchor its largest international infrastructure project in India underscores the nation’s growing technical talent pool, favorable regulatory environment, and scalable energy infrastructure. With this move, OpenAI and Tata are not just building a data center — they are laying the foundation for the next era of AI innovation in the Global South.