Hyderabad: Microsoft opened its largest hyperscale region in India, the India South Central cloud region, at Chandanvelly on the outskirts of Hyderabad on Thursday. Its second data centre in Hyderabad, the facility is part of Microsoft’s larger investment of $20.5 billion in AI infrastructure in India by 2030.The new cloud region, Microsoft’s fourth in India after existing ones in Chennai, Hyderabad and Pune, has a resilient three-zone architecture and is roughly equivalent to two Eden Gardens stadiums combined in size, Microsoft said. The region is designed to support demand for cloud, AI and high-density compute services across India and the wider region.Inaugurating the facility, Telangana IT and industries minister D Sridhar Babu said the investment adds momentum to Telangana’s aspirations of achieving 5 GW of data centre capacity by 2029 as part of its strategic AI roadmap and of targeting around $30 billion in investment across the broader AI and digital infrastructure ecosystem by then.“Microsoft’s investment will further strengthen Hyderabad’s ability to power the next generation of AI, cloud and digital innovation for India and the world. It is aligned with Telangana’s Hyderabad Global AI Strategy, which brings together AI City, the Global AI Innovation Hub, AIKAM and TGDeX to support the development and adoption of AI at scale,” Sridhar Babu said.Telangana currently has 300 MW of data centre capacity already operational and 2 GW under development across global and Indian operators. Microsoft, AWS, Iron Mountain, CtrlS, Sify, TCL, NTT DATA and CapitaLand are among companies investing in the state, with the new projects increasingly being designed for AI-scale compute, high-density GPUs, hyperscale cloud and advanced cooling.Microsoft India and South Asia president Puneet Chandok said Hyderabad’s talent base, innovation ecosystem and AI-ready cloud infrastructure position the city to power AI transformation for customers across the region.Rajiv Kumar, managing director and president of Microsoft India Development Centre, said the company would continue to support local communities through skilling, workforce development and sustainability initiatives.Microsoft said the Hyderabad data centre region operates with effectively zero water use for cooling and is backed by groundwater recharge, rainwater harvesting and watershed resilience programmes. Its initiatives include a Data Center Academy with IIIT Hyderabad, Young India Skills University and Don Bosco Tech Society.
