Meta has taken another step forward in its effort to build up its AI infrastructure with the unveiling of a plan for its first data center in India.
The social media giant confirmed in a release that it had agreed to lease a facility from India-based conglomerate Reliance Industries in the city of Jamnagar, in the western state of Gujarat.
Reliance will build the center, with operations expected to start in two years, with a confirmed initial capacity of 168 megawatts and options to scale in the future.
Under the agreement, Reliance said it will provide end-to-end services for the lifecycle of the data center, including management of utilities and connectivity.
The deal marks an extension of the partnership between Meta and Reliance, following Meta’s $5.7 billion investment in the Indian company’s Jio Platforms in 2020, and its participation in a joint venture with a subsidiary, Reliance Intelligence, last year. No financials were confirmed for the data center project.
In tandem with the data center plan, Meta said it was partnering with Indian companies CleanMax and Fourth Partner Energy to provide nearly 1 gigawatt of renewable energy as the infrastructure build-up gathers momentum.
India is rapidly emerging as a key hub for AI infrastructure, with a number of key players, including Microsoft, Amazon and OpenAI all unveiling major investments in the country over the past six months.
However, Reliance’s chairman Mukesh Ambani said the Meta deal could be the most significant yet.
“This partnership with Meta marks a transformative moment for India’s digital infrastructure,” he said in a statement. “Building India’s first built-to-suit data center for a global technology leader of Meta’s scale demonstrates India’s readiness to be at the forefront of the global AI revolution.
While Meta had good news to trumpet in India, it met frustration in Europe as the EU Commission did not back down in the ongoing battle over the company’s decision to block rival companies’ AI chatbots from using WhatsApp’s business API.
The commission on June 8 ordered Meta to restore free access to WhatsApp for rivals until the end of the commission’s antitrust probe. The EU alleges Meta has been abusing its “dominant position” in Europe and made its position clear in a toughly worded statement.
In a statement to media outlets, Meta said: “The European Commission has decided that OpenAI and some of the largest companies in the world can use the paid-for WhatsApp Business product for free. This is regulatory overreach subsidized by the many European companies that pay. We will appeal.”
