SYDNEY, June 5 (Reuters) - Australia's AirTrunk said on Friday it would invest $30 billion in India within the next four years to build out 5 gigawatts of new data centre capacity in the South Asian nation.
Sydney-headquartered AirTrunk, backed by Blackstone and Canadian Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB) entered the Indian market in April with its purchase of Lumina CloudInfra.
The firm's Indian development pipeline includes 600 megawatts of capacity projects in the key cities of Mumbai, Chennai
and Hyderabad but the range will be increased with the new investment.
Chief Executive Robin Khuda, who met Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday, said India was now considered one of the Australian company's most significant long-term investment destinations.
"One of the strongest messages we took away from this week was a genuine sense of urgency. There is a recognition that AI investment is a global race and that capital will flow to places that are prepared to compete for it," Khuda said.
"Every market has strengths and challenges. What investors consistently look for is certainty, coordination and speed."
India is becoming a global hotspot for AI development by offering tax breaks for foreign firms operating from domestic data centres.
Its biggest conglomerates are also stepping up a push into AI and data infrastructure, with Reliance and Adani committing about $110 billion and $100 billion, respectively, in February.
(Reporting by Scott Murdoch in Sydney; Editing by Christopher Cushing and Clarence Fernandez)
