Andhra SIPB clears RIL's Rs 1,08,010 crore Vizag Data Centre proposal

Hyderabad: Andhra Pradesh's State Investment Promotion Board (SIPB) on Wednesday cleared the proposal by Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) to set up a Rs 1,08,010 crore Data Centre project in Visakhapatnam and also Rs 51,300 crore Solar Power Project with Battery Energy Storage in Sri Sathya Sai district.

RIL during the investors summit that was held in Visakhapatnam last November announced that it will build a fully modular, future-ready 1 GW AI data centre designed to host the world’s most advanced GPUs, TPUs and AI processors in Andhra Pradesh.

RIL at that time did not announce the location of the proposed AI Data Centre. However, sources in Andhra Pradesh government on Wednesday confirmed the scale of the investment in the data centre and also the location as Visakhapatnam.

This facility will operate as a twin to the company’s gigawatt-scale AI data centre in Jamnagar, creating one of Asia’s most powerful AI infrastructure networks. To ensure clean and sustainable energy for the upcoming AI infrastructure, Reliance will also develop a 6 GWp solar power project in Andhra Pradesh.

The Government of Andhra Pradesh and Reliance Industries signed an MoU to establish this 1 GW artificial intelligence data centre, in the presence of chief minister Chandrababu Naidu, Minister for IT Nara Lokesh, and Reliance Industries Executive Director PMS Prasad at the investors summit in November last year.

Google had a few days ago broken ground to commence the work on the 1 GW AI led Data Centre in Visakhapatnam. Google is establishing this data centre in collaboration with Adani Group and Airtel.

On Wednesday, the SIPB chaired by chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu had in total approved investment proposals worth Rs 2,01,023 crore including RIL's proposals. These projects are expected to generate 39,067 employment opportunities across the state.

Naidu said that every investment proposal must be grounded as per schedule. Projects must be completed within defined timelines from approvals to production. There should be zero delay in granting permissions, he said.

The major investments approved by SIPB include Rs 1,08,010 crore Data Centre project by Reliance Industries in Visakhapatnam, Rs 51,300 crore Solar Power Project with Battery Energy Storage in Sri Sathya Sai district by Reliance. Rs 12,297 crore Pumped Storage Hydro Project in Kadapa by Adani Group and Rs 2,508 crore Motorcycle Manufacturing Unit by Royal Enfield in Tirupati.

The Chief Minister stressed the need for expansion of gas pipeline infrastructure in industrial zones, and the need for value addition in crops like oil palm, mango, coconut and cocoa to benefit farmers. Other major investments cleared include DRDO-linked Quantum Valley project in Amaravati, Food processing investments in agro-processing units across Anantapur and Annamayya districts, Apollo Tyres, ITC, Chettinad.