Bharti Enterprises Chairman Sunil Bharti Mittal says a cooling in U.S. artificial intelligence investment could give India room to attract more computing and data-center projects as global capacity expands.
NDTV published Mittal’s interview Nov. 13. He compared the AI boom with the dot-com cycle, saying the investment surge could face a shakeout even as the technology endures. “Superintelligence is here to stay,” he said.
India’s Press Information Bureau said shared computing capacity under the IndiaAI Mission exceeded 45,000 graphics processing units as of June 2026. Through August, 237 projects received subsidized computing for a combined 93.18 lakh GPU hours. The government factsheet lists installed data-center capacity at about 1,575 megawatts, up from 375 megawatts in 2020.
Crisil Ratings projects India’s installed third-party colocation capacity will reach about 7.5 gigawatts by March 2030, five times the current level. The rating agency estimates the buildout will draw more than ₹3 lakh crore over four fiscal years. It said generative AI demand, enterprise digitalization and rising data use are driving expansion.
Crisil also said more than 95% of capacity under construction was contracted. It identified power supply, grid connections, regulatory approvals and project execution as constraints, and said large upfront spending leaves developers carrying elevated debt before projects generate cash.
The scale of planned investment is also visible in France. SoftBank Group said it committed to develop and operate 5 gigawatts of AI data-center capacity there, with investment of up to €75 billion. The Hauts-de-France phase is expected to add 3.1 gigawatts by 2031 at a planned cost of €45 billion.
Mittal’s view that a U.S. slowdown could benefit India remains a forecast; the supplied figures document existing capacity and planned growth, not a shift in investment.
