Bengaluru: Microsoft on Thursday launched its fourth cloud region in India, in Hyderabad, as the technology major steps up investments to meet surging demand for AI and cloud services from enterprises and regulated sectors.The new India South Central region will allow customers to run Microsoft Cloud services and workloads from Hyderabad while meeting data residency, security and compliance requirements. The company said the facility is designed to support mission-critical applications and AI workloads.With the launch, Microsoft now operates cloud regions in Pune, Chennai, Mumbai and Hyderabad, giving it the largest hyperscale cloud footprint in India. It also operates two data centres in partnership with Jio.The Hyderabad region is part of Microsoft’s $20.5 billion investment commitment towards cloud and AI infrastructure in India, announced in 2025.“Whether it is a Frontier Firm already running AI at scale or an enterprise taking its first steps, customers need trusted infrastructure close to where their data resides,” said Puneet Chandok, president, Microsoft India and South Asia.Microsoft said Azure has recorded strong double-digit growth in India over the past two years, driven by rising enterprise adoption of AI.The company said more than 90% of Nifty100 companies use Microsoft 365 Copilot, while Infosys, TCS, Wipro and LTIMindtree together have deployed more than 400,000 Copilot seats globally.According to industry researcher IDC, India’s public cloud services market is projected to reach $45.7 billion by 2030, growing at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 22.2%, while AI spending is expected to grow at nearly twice that pace.
