Techie; Falls for the sense of humour; Soft corner to the Entrepreneurs; Understands Raajneeti & Ranneeti; Admiring technologies solving the world’s problems
AirTrunk just announced ₹3 lakh crore to build 5 GW of data center capacity in India by 2030.
That alone is more than 3x the entire country's operational capacity today.
The headlines will focus on the operator. But ₹3 lakh crore doesn't stay with the operator. It builds the shell and buys everything inside it.
So, the more useful question is: where does this money actually flow? Here's the full value chain 👇
India runs 1.5 GW of operational data center capacity today across 160+ facilities. Street estimates put the country at 5-8 GW by 2030. Market size: $10bn in 2025 → $22bn by 2030.
AirTrunk entered India, via the Lumina CloudInfra buyout, with a 600 MW starting pipeline across Mumbai, Chennai and Hyderabad. Backed by Blackstone and CPPIB.
The demand stack is broad:
🔹 AI training and inference
🔹 Hyperscale cloud (AWS, Azure, Google)
🔹 Data localisation (RBI norms, DPDP Act)
🔹 5G + 25GB+ monthly data per user
🔹 Digital payments and enterprise digitisation
India builds at ~$6-7M per MW, cheaper than Singapore or Japan. Cheap to build, captive demand, 20-year tax holidays. Structural, not cyclical.
⚡️ Why AI Data centers are a different from Traditional Data Centers.
A traditional rack draws 5-15 kW. An AI rack draws 30-130 kW. NVIDIA's GB200 NVL72 pulls 130 kW in one rack. A GPU burns 700-1,000W per chip. A CPU burns 150-200W.
That single fact rewrites the build:
🔹 Air cooling dies past 30-40 kW per rack. Liquid cooling becomes mandatory (handles 100-200 kW)
🔹 PUE matters more. Liquid runs 1.05-1.15 vs 1.4-1.6 for air
🔹 More fiber per rack for high-density, low-latency interconnect
🔹 Heavier power gear per MW. Transformers, switchgear, UPS
An AI data center consumes far more equipment per MW than a legacy colo. The spend concentrates below the operator.
The value chain, layer by layer
Land + build → operators
🔹 Anant Raj: 28 MW operational, targeting 63 MW by Dec 2026, 357 MW by FY32. DC + cloud revenue ₹176 cr in FY26.
🔹 Bharti Airtel (Nxtra), Reliance (Jio), Adani (AdaniConneX). Jefferies sees these three at 35-40% of capacity by 2030. Sify is the NASDAQ-listed pure play.
Power infrastructure → the real chokepoint
🔹 Hitachi Energy India: order backlog ₹29,000 cr. Data center was the single largest order-segment contributor in both Q3 and Q4 FY26. Just added ₹2,000 cr capex for a new transformer plant.
🔹 CG Power: order book ₹14,800 cr across transformers and switchgear.
🔹 GE Vernova T&D, Siemens Energy, ABB India sit in the same HV pool.
Backup power → gensets, batteries, UPS
🔹 Cummins India: in Q2 FY26 its power-gen segment grew 50% YoY, with data centers alone making up ~40% of that segment. Every 1 MW of IT load needs up to ~1.5 MW of standby diesel.
🔹 Kirloskar Oil Engines: KOEL Green, the other large listed genset name.
🔹 Amara Raja: largest share in India's data center battery segment (VRLA / UPS).
Cables (power + EHV)
🔹 Polycab: Data centers named as a core driver under its ₹6,000-8,000 cr "Project Spring" capex.
🔹 KEI Industries: EHV cables + US data center exports.
Cooling
🔹 Aeroflex Industries: Just entered AI data center liquid-cooling skid assemblies, 5% of FY26 sales, management guiding to 20-22% in FY27 as it scales capacity from 2,000 to 15,000 skids a year.
🔹 Blue Star, Voltas: precision cooling and chillers. As liquid cooling scales, this layer shifts from commodity HVAC to mission critical.
Connectivity → optical fiber
🔹 Sterlite Technologies (STL): order book ₹7,309 cr in FY26, Enterprise + DC is 20% of revenue, guided to 30%. Its Celesta cable packs 864 fibres in a sub-12mm diameter, built for AI data halls.
🔹 HFCL: optical fiber + telecom equipment.
Compute → servers, GPUs, AI cloud
🔹 Netweb Technologies: AI segment grew 460% YoY in Q4. Won a ₹1,734 cr sovereign-AI order on NVIDIA Blackwell under the IndiaAI Mission.
🔹 E2E Networks: the listed GPU-cloud play. 3,900 NVIDIA GPUs, deploying Blackwell B200 clusters, empanelled under the IndiaAI Mission, hosting capacity at L&T's Chennai facility.
📌The opportunity ahead:
India’s data center opportunity is moving from 1.5 GW today to 5–8 GW by 2030.
But the real opportunity is not just in operators. It is in the layers beneath them: power, cooling, fiber, equipment and compute infrastructure.
As AI workloads rise, every MW needs more equipment intensity than before.
Digital India was earlier an app story. This decade, it becomes a hard-infrastructure story.
📌Disclaimer: This is for educational purposes only and is not a buy or sell recommendation. Please do your own research.
India’s digital infrastructure journey is gathering remarkable momentum.
AirTrunk has announced plans to invest around Rs. 3 lakh crore ($30 billion) in India, and develop 5 GW of data centre capacity. This is among the largest proposed investments in the country’s digital infrastructure ecosystem.
Such investments will strengthen India’s position as a global hub for cloud computing and AI, while generating employment opportunities, supporting local supply chains and accelerating innovation-led growth.
It is clear that the future of the world’s digital economy is increasingly being shaped in India!
தமிழ்நாடு சமூக நீதி முற்போக்குக் (TVK+INC+VCK+IUML+CPI+CPM) கூட்டணியின் முதல் MP வேட்பாளராகத் தேர்ந்தெடுக்கப்பட்டதை பெருமையாகவும் பெரும் பொறுப்பாகவும் கருதுகிறேன்
என் மீது நம்பிக்கை வைத்த LoP @RahulGandhi மற்றும் தமிழக CM @TVKVijayHQ க்கு மனமார்ந்த நன்றி
தேர்ந்தெடுக்கப்பட்ட ���ிறகு, இந்திய நாடாளுமன்றத்தில் தமிழ் மக்களின் துணிச்சலான, விசுவாசமான மற்றும் நேர்மையான குரலாக ஒலிப்பேன் என்று லட்சக்கணக்கான கூட்டணித் தொண்டர்களுக்கு உறுதியளிக்கிறேன்
I am deeply grateful to everyone who has conveyed their wishes, blessings, and good wishes on this special occasion.
This affection from people across Karnataka and the country strengthens my resolve to serve with humility, dedication, and honesty. The trust placed in me is not merely an honour, it is a responsibility that I will carry with utmost sincerity.
I seek the continued blessings and support of our people as we work together to build a stronger, more prosperous, and more compassionate Karnataka.
Karnataka First. People First. Always.
The real power behind CM @DKShivakumar is his brother DK Suresh Anna 💛❤
Silent strength, strong backbone, and always standing beside his brother in every battle. 🔥
#DKCM
I recall getting a frantic call in Dec 2021 from @DKShivakumar just days after he took charge as President of @INCKarnataka
He sought my help to launch a new digital membership program. He said “I want to rebuild @INCKarnataka using state of the art technology”
Within days, we had a grand launch with over 100 tv screens connecting thousands of party workers from every district
He was a man with a mission & in a hurry
To strengthen the party
To win the 2023 state election
To govern the state
He achieved it all
Knowing him, he will still be on a mission & in a hurry for the next big thing…..
Best wishes to @DKShivakumar in steering Karnataka to greater glory & prosperity, especially for its youth
RCB RCB….Congratulations Double back to back IPL Champions. Namma dodda Simhagulu roared loudly and made us all very proud. Very well done you beauties.
🇺🇸Jensen Huang is out there living his best life, dancing at the NVIDIA all-employee celebration event in Taipei, Taiwan
You'd never guess he's the CEO 😂
Research Officer Urvashi and I visited @boschindia and met Mr Guruprasad Mudlapur, Managing Director and Chairperson, CII Karnataka and team. Useful update on Karnataka's diverse and active CII chapter, and a discussion on Indian and global economic opportunities & challenges.
Caught red-handed! First in queue at railway counter, OTP verified twice, yet ticket given to a broker. Staff arguing when confronted. Tatkal scam still thriving.
In my very first video of my financial markets journey
I have tried to decode the backbone behind our day-to-day e-commerce and quick-commerce deliveries in the video below.
In this video, I look at three listed logistics companies in India: Shadowfax Technologies, Delhivery and Blue Dart.
Most of us have heard of Delhivery and Blue Dart, or have at least seen their names on parcels and delivery vehicles. But Shadowfax is also one of the fastest-growing companies in this space and remains relatively less visible compared to the other two.
I discuss all three companies in the video — how their business models are set up, what makes each of them different, how they performed in Q4 FY26, and the key takeaways from their latest investor concalls.
Grok foundation model V9-Medium (1.5T) has finished training. Evals look good. A lot of Cursor data was added in supplementary training and there is more to come.
Fine-tuning is underway and reinforcement learning begins in a few days. 2 to 3 weeks to public release.
This will be a major improvement over the 0.5T v8-small that currently serves all Grok production traffic, especially for difficult coding tasks.