How AI is Fueling India’s Tech Boom

India is on the verge of becoming a global AI powerhouse—not by chasing Silicon Valley's approach, but by building its own path, uniquely suited to its scale, complexity, and opportunity.

While many countries boast young populations and rising tech enthusiasm, India has two distinct advantages that no other emerging market can match:

1. A 50-year-old technology ecosystem, built by global IT leaders like Infosys and Tata Consultancy Services.

2. An elite talent pipeline, with top-tier institutions like the Indian Institutes of Technology (IITs) and Indian Institutes of Management (IIMs), producing CEOs of global giants like Google and Microsoft.

But what's truly fueling India’s AI revolution is its homemade digital public infrastructure, known as the India Stack—a foundational layer of interoperable, open-source platforms that has digitized everything from identity and payments to banking and authentication for over a billion people.

The India Stack: An AI Launchpad

India Stack is a multilayered platform that includes:

• Aadhaar: A digital biometric ID system rolled out in 2010 that now covers nearly the entire population.

• UPI (Unified Payments Interface): Launched in 2016, it has become the world’s largest real-time payments system, now processing nearly 20 billion transactions per month—more than Visa’s global volume.

• eKYC and Digital Banking Access: Aadhaar-enabled eKYC brought 800 million Indians into the banking system over the past decade.

• Ultra-low-cost data: Mobile data in India is the cheapest in the world—just $0.09/GB compared to $6/GB in the U.S.—driving mass smartphone adoption and usage.

These digital rails have transformed India from a predominantly cash-based society into a booming digital economy, laying the groundwork for AI to scale rapidly and cost-effectively.

AI at Work: Use Cases, Not Just Hype

India isn’t competing to build the world’s biggest Large Language Models (LLMs). Instead, it's becoming the use case capital of the world—deploying AI where it matters most.

Here are a few real-world applications already underway:

• Government Services: AI-powered biometric authentication ensures pension payments only go to living recipients—yes, it verifies you're alive via fingerprint scan at post offices.

• Agriculture: Voice-activated AI tools are being developed for farmers, helping them access hyper-localized weather, crop, and market information in native dialects.

• Education: With high illiteracy in rural areas, India is deploying AI-driven video and voice learning tools to supplement underperforming schools.

• Language AI: The "AI for Bharat" initiative, led by IIT Madras and the Ministry of Electronics & IT, is developing LLMs that understand India’s 22 official languages and hundreds of dialects.

India’s Startup Surge Meets AI

Since India’s 2016 “digital big bang,” the country has gone from 471 startups to over 150,000 today. And AI is at the core of many of them:

• Eternal (formerly Zomato): Originally a food delivery company, it's now also leading in B2B restaurant supply and quick commerce. AI is powering hyperlocal inventory optimization, customer service bots, and cost-cutting automation.

• Paytm: The fintech giant is using AI for fraud detection, customer onboarding, and merchant lending—driving its return to profitability.

• PolicyBazaar: India’s online insurance leader leverages AI to streamline claims, improve underwriting, and prevent fraud.

• Ixigo: This travel app helps users book trains and buses with AI-powered voice assistants—especially critical in a multilingual country with many first-time digital users.

What Comes Next?

India has already proven it can deploy technology at an unprecedented scale and ultra-low cost. With over 1.4 billion people, a thriving startup ecosystem, and a government that is aggressively promoting AI through national initiatives, India is uniquely positioned to become a world leader in AI implementation, particularly in solving real-world problems.

Visionaries like Nandan Nilekani (co-founder of Infosys and architect of Aadhaar) have been clear: The goal isn’t just to build flashy models—it’s to apply AI at population scale to deliver tangible benefits across education, health, agriculture, and more.

As Sam Altman of OpenAI now acknowledges, India’s creative momentum and AI adoption is outpacing expectations.

The Investment Opportunity

India is now the fourth-largest economy, soon to overtake Germany. However, the real growth engine is its Internet economy, projected to grow nearly 500% over the next eight years, outpacing both GDP and global peers.

At EMQQ Global, we believe India’s tech and AI-led transformation makes it one of the most compelling investment stories of this decade. Our India Internet Index (INQQ) tracks the companies driving this transformation—from digital payments and logistics to AI-powered platforms across consumer services, insurance, and fintech.

India’s digital foundation is built. AI is the accelerant. And the runway ahead is long.

Want to learn more about how to invest in India’s digital future?

Visit EMQQGlobal.com or reach out for a deeper discussion.