Meta and Reliance partner to build AI-enabled data centre in India

Meta and Reliance Industries have announced a strategic partnership to build an AI-enabled data centre in India. The facility will be located in Jamnagar, Gujarat, and is part of Meta's long-term commitment to India, which has become one of the fastest-growing markets. 

Meta said, “Jamnagar is a strategic location, and Reliance is developing one of the largest data centre campuses in the world there, with access to the significant energy resources needed to power advanced AI-enabled infrastructure.”

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The data centre will provide the computing power and infrastructure needed to support Meta's products, including Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, and AI services, along with its future "personal superintelligence" ambitions. Under the partnership, Reliance will be offering its construction expertise to build the data centre, while Meta will lease and use its capacity instead of owning and operating the facility directly.

The facility will have a capacity of 168 megawatts (MW) to run servers and AI workloads. However, they have also planned to expand capacity in the future. Mark Zuckerberg, Founder and CEO, Meta, said, “We’re proud to be working with Reliance to build our first AI-enabled data centre in India. This world-class facility in Jamnagar will help us scale our AI infrastructure globally while deepening our long-term investment in India’s economy.”

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The blog post further highlighted that the data centre will run on renewable energy, and it will also be using desalinated seawater to reduce reliance on freshwater resources. Meta also claims to bear the full cost of the electricity and water, as it sees the investment as an important step in its global expansion of AI and data centre infrastructure.

Alongside data centre expansion in India, it will also strengthen Meta's existing partnership with Reliance, across connectivity, ommerce and AI innovation. Mukesh D. Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director, Reliance Industries, said, “This partnership with Meta marks a transformative moment for India’s digital infrastructure. Building India’s first built-to-suit AI data centre for a global technology leader of Meta’s scale demonstrates India’s readiness to be at the forefront of the global AI revolution.”