Delhi AI Impact Summit | Microsoft to invest $50 billion in 'Global South' AI push

Microsoft on Wednesday said it plans to invest $50 billion by the end of the decade to expand AI across countries in the 'Global South'.

The company made the announcement at the ongoing India AI Impact Summit 2026 in Delhi.

Since the advent of generative Artificial Intelligence in late 2022, the adoption rate has been concentrated in developed and emerging nations. Still, there is hardly any noteworthy implementation of new-age technology in the low-income countries of the Global South.

The 'Global South' refers to ‌developing, emerging ‌or lower-income countries, mostly ‌in the ‌southern hemisphere.

As per Microsoft’s latest AI Diffusion Report shows that AI usage in the Global North is roughly twice that of the Global South. And this divide continues to widen. This disparity impacts not only national and regional economic growth, but also whether AI can deliver on its broader promise of expanding opportunity and prosperity around the world, Microsoft noted.

Last year, Microsoft unveiled $17.5 billion worth of AI investments, as the US tech giant deepened its bet on one of the ​world's fastest-growing digital ​markets.

Now, it plans to further expand investments in underserved nations in Asia and Africa.

With a $50 billion investment, Microsoft aims to improve in five key areas:

--Building the infrastructure needed for AI diffusion

-- Empowering people through technology and skills for schools and nonprofits

-- Strengthening multilingual and multicultural AI capabilities

-- Enabling local AI innovations that address community needs

-- Measuring AI diffusion to guide future AI policies and investments

Microsoft plans to extend internet access to 250 million people in unserved and underserved communities in the Global South, including 100 million people in Africa.

In addition to scaling the infrastructure, Microsoft will offer ways for people to improve their technology skills, which is critically important for the economic development of emerging nations.

It will also expand the MLCommons AILuminate benchmark to include major Indic and Asian languages, so that people will be able to make good use of gen AI tools.

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