Microsoft joins India’s Yotta Data Services to boost AI innovation in country

New Delhi: Microsoft and Yotta Data Services, India’s leading sovereign cloud infrastructure and platform services provider, on Wednesday partnered to accelerate artificial intelligence (AI) adoption in India.

The partnership enables Microsoft and Yotta to engage with IndiaAI Mission participants, government agencies, IITs, startups, enterprises, and software development companies to leapfrog AI innovation.

Microsoft said it would bring its AzureAI services to Shakti Cloud, Yotta’s AI cloud platform, to offer cutting-edge AI capabilities to developers, startups, enterprises, and public sector organisations across India.

“Our partnership with Yotta to power Shakti Cloud will help unlock AI innovation at scale. Microsoft is honoured to play its part in helping the country realise its AI ambitions through innovation that reflect India’s unique needs and priorities,” said Puneet Chandok, President, Microsoft India and South Asia.

India is already among the top global markets on AI adoption and return on investment. Together with Yotta, we will continue to help India become an AI-first nation, securely and responsibly, he added.

As of May, IndiaAI Mission has received over 500 proposals for developing indigenous AI models.

Shakti Cloud customers will benefit from a rich ecosystem and vast catalogue of foundational LLMs and SLMs available on Azure AI Foundry to develop, deploy and scale at the speed of AI.

Built-in safety tools, content filters, groundedness detection, and copyright protection will empower organisations to build and scale AI responsibly. As a global provider of software, infrastructure, and cloud services, Microsoft runs on trust and enables trustworthy AI by prioritising security, privacy, and safety.

“This partnership is a key step forward towards India’s AI self-reliance and digital transformation, and we are excited to be able to support Indian enterprises in their journey towards AI excellence with a full gamut of offerings,” said Sunil Gupta, Co-founder, CEO and Managing Director, Yotta Data Services.

The combined strength of Microsoft’s services backed by Yotta’s infrastructure gives access to some of the best capabilities to support AI development in the country.

“It will make cutting-edge AI capabilities accessible for Indian enterprises of all sizes and give a huge boost to driving the nation’s AI ambitions,” Gupta noted.

In January this year, Microsoft chairman and CEO Satya Nadella announced a collaboration with IndiaAI, a division of Digital India Corporation, to advance AI and emerging technologies in the country, and established AI Centre of Excellence and AI Productivity Labs to foster inclusive growth.

—IANS