Tech billionaires fly in for Delhi AI expo as Modi jostles to lead in south | AI (artificial intelligence)
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/feb/18/delhi-ai-expo-modi-jostles-lead-south
Publish Date: 2026-02-18 00:00:00
Source Domain: www.theguardian.com
Silicon Valley tech billionaires will land in Delhi this week for an AI summit hosted by India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, where leaders of the global south will wrestle for control over the fast-developing technology.
During the week-long AI Impact Summit, attended by thousands of tech executives, government officials and AI safety experts, tech companies valued at trillions of dollars will rub along with leaders of countries such as Kenya and Indonesia, where average wages dip well below $1,000 a month.
Amid a push to speed up AI adoption across the globe, Sundar Pichai, Sam Altman and Dario Amodei, the heads of Google, OpenAI and Anthropic, will all be there. Rishi Sunak and George Osborne, a former British prime minister and a former chancellor, will each be pushing for greater adoption of AI. Sunak has taken jobs for Microsoft and Anthropic and Osborne leads OpenAI’s push to deepen and widen the use of ChatGPT beyond its existing 800 million users.
Meanwhile Modi, who will address the summit on Thursday, is positioning India as the AI hub for south Asia and Africa. On the agenda will be AI’s potential to transform agriculture, water supplies and public health. Governments in Kenya, Senegal, Mauritius, Togo, Indonesia and Egypt will send ministers.
Modi’s enthusiasm for AI has a darker side, civil liberties campaigners say. Last week they raised serious concerns about India deploying AI to increase state surveillance, discriminate against minorities and sway elections. But Modi this week spoke of “harnessing artificial intelligence for human-centric progress” and India has given the summit the strapline: “Welfare for all, happiness for all.”
A visitor looks at a Jio intelligence bot on display at Bharat Mandapam, one of the venues for the AI Impact Summit in Delhi. Photograph: Bhawika Chhabra/ReutersDelhi commuters walk past a hoarding advertising the summit. Photograph: Arun Sankar/AFP/Getty Images
Summit observers talk of a battle between a…
