In a big boost to make the Visakhapatnam as the major technology hub in the country, theTech giant Google signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Andhra Pradesh government in Delhi on Tuesday for the establishment of a 1 gigawatt hyperscale data center in Visakhapatnam.
The event held at the Tajman Singh Hotel was attended by Chief Minister Chandrababu Naidu, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and IT and Communications Minister Ashwini Vaishnav.AP Minister Nara Lokesh, Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurien, Global Infrastructure Vice President Bikash Kole, and Google Cloud Asia Pacific President Karan Bajwal were also present.
Before the agreement, AP CM Chandrababu met Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurien. This agreement will lay the foundation for transforming Visakhapatnam into an AI city. Google will set up a 1 gigawatt hyperscale data center with an investment of about 10 billion dollars (Rs. 88,628 crores).
The AP government will launch the establishment of India’s first artificial intelligence center named ‘Google AI Hub’ in Visakhapatnam (google ai data center vizag). It is estimated that this project will contribute Rs. 10,518 crores annually to the state’s gross domestic product between 2028-2032. In addition, officials estimate that there will be an opportunity to create about 1,88,220 direct and indirect jobs (google data center vizag jobs).
If this data center becomes available, the entire IT ecosystem of Andhra Pradesh will change. Vizag is set to become an AI city. The government recently said that this data center will be the cornerstone of modern economic infrastructure. It said that it will accelerate AI, cloud computing, IoT (Internet of Things), 5G, and e-governance platforms.
It said that through this data center, allied sectors like power, fiber optics, real estate, and telecommunications will get a boost. As a result, it said that the demand for roads, power, and fiber connectivity will increase. If all this happens, the government is hopeful that the state will generate revenue through electricity duty, property tax, and SGST.