Microsoft chairman and chief executive officer Satya Nadella kicked off his visit to India yesterday by reinforcing the company’s commitment to supporting India’s transformation into an AI-first nation. The commitment aligns with India’s vision of becoming self-reliant by fostering a skilled AI workforce and empowering every sector and industry to transform with AI.
Nadella made the comments at the Microsoft CEO Connection event in Mumbai on Wednesday, which was attended by top business leaders and decision makers. During his address, Nadella announced that Microsoft will provide 2 million people in India with AI skilling opportunities by 2025, through its new ADVANTA(I)GE INDIA initiative. This will help to close skills gaps across the nation and strengthen India’s ability to thrive in the AI era.
“India is uniquely positioned to make the promise of AI a reality,” said Satya Nadella, chairman and CEO, Microsoft. “We are committed to partnering broadly across the public and private sector to help close the nation’s AI skills gap and create new opportunity throughout the country.”
“The ADVANTA(I)GE INDIA initiative is a significant step towards democratizing access to AI skills across the nation and reflects Microsoft’s deep commitment to enabling inclusive growth with technology,” saidPuneet Chandok, president of Microsoft India & South Asia. “India has a huge opportunity to be a global leader in AI, and creating AI fluency at scale is a critical step in that journey. This initiative aims to propel India into a promising era of AI fluency, empowering citizens across India with the right skills to thrive in the age of AI.”
Nadella highlighted how Microsoft Copilot, along with the company’s other AI solutions, is driving measurable productivity gains for people and organizations by helping them complete work faster and with superior quality. For instance, recent research on early users of Copilot for Microsoft 365 found that they were 29 percent faster in a series of tasks, including searching, writing, and summarizing.
Many organizations in India are already boosting their productivity and accelerating innovation using Copilot for Microsoft 365 and GitHub Copilot. Nadella mentioned names such as Axis Bank, Infosys, HCL Tech, and LTIMindtree that have leveraged Copilot in multiple ways.
He said that organizations in India are seeing an average US$3.86 return for every US dollar spent on AI projects, and more than 150 organizations are already innovating with Azure OpenAI Service across industries such as agriculture, aviation, ecommerce, and fast-moving consumer goods. They include names like ITC, Karya, an Indian social impact organization, Arvind Limited, India’s largest denim manufacturer, and Air India.
