BENGALURU: Ola co-founder and CEO Bhavish Aggarwal on Thursday said that artificial intelligence sovereignty is necessary for India and that the country needs to build a future on its terms to control the technologies in the time to come. “Otherwise, we will just end up becoming monthly active user farms for global companies,” he told TOI on the sidelines of an event.
The Bengaluru-headquartered company said its AI company Krutrim is working on manufacturing India’s first AI silicon chip by 2026.If successful, it will pit Ola against the likes of Nvidia, AMD and Intel. Tech giants Meta, Google, Apple and Amazon are also making proprietary AI chips.
Ola announced strategic partnerships with global majors such as chip design company ARM and Canadian AI company Untether AI to build the chips. The AI chip is expected to enable development of faster and more efficient AI systems.
“We are still exploring foundries, we will go with a global tier I or II foundry. Taiwan is a global leader, and so is Korea. I visited Taiwan a couple of months back and the ecosystem is keen on partnering with India,” Aggarwal said. Krutrim also unveiled Krutrim cloud with AI and general-purpose capabilities, in addition to a wide range of purpose-built AI services for the developer community to build products. It has made these data centre services worth Rs 100 crore completely free for developers and enterprises alike till Diwali.
New motorcycles:
Ola Electric Mobility launched its first set of electric motorcycles due for deliveries from the fourth quarter of the current financial year. The EV maker expects to integrate its indigenous Bharat 4680 cell into its vehicles starting the first quarter of the financial year ended March 2026. The cell is currently under trial production at Ola’s Gigafactory, and will be the first such in India when released.
Ola Cabs rebranding:
Ola Cabs, Aggarwal’s ride-sharing business, has been rebranded as Ola Consumer and will expand to new cities. Besides, it will offer one year of free Krutrim Cloud for all ONDC suppliers, applicable for startups and small and medium enterprises. D2C (direct to consumer) brands will also be given one year of free access.
The Bengaluru-headquartered company said its AI company Krutrim is working on manufacturing India’s first AI silicon chip by 2026.If successful, it will pit Ola against the likes of Nvidia, AMD and Intel. Tech giants Meta, Google, Apple and Amazon are also making proprietary AI chips.
Ola announced strategic partnerships with global majors such as chip design company ARM and Canadian AI company Untether AI to build the chips. The AI chip is expected to enable development of faster and more efficient AI systems.
“We are still exploring foundries, we will go with a global tier I or II foundry. Taiwan is a global leader, and so is Korea. I visited Taiwan a couple of months back and the ecosystem is keen on partnering with India,” Aggarwal said. Krutrim also unveiled Krutrim cloud with AI and general-purpose capabilities, in addition to a wide range of purpose-built AI services for the developer community to build products. It has made these data centre services worth Rs 100 crore completely free for developers and enterprises alike till Diwali.
New motorcycles:
Ola Electric Mobility launched its first set of electric motorcycles due for deliveries from the fourth quarter of the current financial year. The EV maker expects to integrate its indigenous Bharat 4680 cell into its vehicles starting the first quarter of the financial year ended March 2026. The cell is currently under trial production at Ola’s Gigafactory, and will be the first such in India when released.
Ola Cabs rebranding:
Ola Cabs, Aggarwal’s ride-sharing business, has been rebranded as Ola Consumer and will expand to new cities. Besides, it will offer one year of free Krutrim Cloud for all ONDC suppliers, applicable for startups and small and medium enterprises. D2C (direct to consumer) brands will also be given one year of free access.