Amazon’s $12.7 billion AI push aims to transform digital inclusion in India by 2030

Amazon commits $12.7 billion towards expanding AI infrastructure and skills across India by 2030, targeting over 15 million small businesses and 4 million students to bolster accessibility and productivity in line with government initiatives.

Amazon has set out an expanded plan to bring artificial intelligence to millions of Indians by 2030, aligning its investments and product roadmap with the Government of India’s AI Mission to improve accessibility, productivity and digital inclusion. According to the original report, the company says it is on track to invest US$12.7 billion in local cloud and AI infrastructure and intends to extend AI benefits to more than 15 million small businesses and 4 million government‑school students by 2030. ^[1][3]

Amazon described the $12.7bn commitment as focused on building cloud and AI capacity across states such as Telangana and Maharashtra, expanding data‑centre and infrastructure footprint to support domestic and public‑sector users. Industry coverage places this pledge alongside large cloud investments from other global tech firms as India scales its AI infrastructure. ^{[1][2][4][6][7]}

The company says AWS has already trained millions in cloud skills, reporting more than 6.2 million people trained since 2017, and frames the new investment as both capacity building and a pipeline for agentic AI skills. Industry reporting notes slightly differing training totals in recent summaries but corroborates AWS’s emphasis on skilling as a central pillar of the initiative. ^[1][2][4]

For small businesses, Amazon outlined a suite of generative AI tools intended to reduce friction in e‑commerce: an evolved Seller Assistant with agentic capabilities, a next‑generation Seller Central dashboard, GenAI tools for listings, Creative Studio for ad creation and a Video Generator to democratise video advertising. The company says hundreds of thousands of sellers globally already use its listings tools and accept AI‑generated recommendations most of the time. ^[1][3]

On consumer shopping, Amazon highlighted features such as Rufus (an AI shopping assistant), Lens AI for visual search, and augmented‑reality “view in your room” experiences to simplify discovery, comparison and purchase decisions across India’s multilingual and varied literacy landscape. Amazon framed these as efforts to remove language and digital‑familiarity barriers for customers across metros, towns and rural districts. ^[1][3]

In education, Amazon pledged AI literacy and career‑awareness programmes for 4 million government‑school students by 2030, including curricula, hands‑on experiments, career tours and teacher training. The company presented this as supporting India’s National Education Policy 2020; government endorsement of the broader AI Mission was quoted in the company materials. ^[1][3]

While Amazon frames the package as a major boost for India’s AI ecosystem, independent coverage situates the move amid similar large investments from other cloud providers and notes variation in how much investment is attributed to specific states or projects. Reporting from Reuters and industry bodies highlights comparable multibillion‑dollar commitments from peers and projects already under way in states such as Maharashtra. Readers should view the company’s claims alongside evolving public disclosures and third‑party reporting as implementation proceeds. ^[5][6][7]

📌 Reference Map:

##Reference Map:

• ^[1] (Deccan Chronicle / Amazon press materials) – Paragraph 1, Paragraph 2, Paragraph 3, Paragraph 4, Paragraph 5, Paragraph 6, Paragraph 7
• ^[2] (Economic Times) – Paragraph 1, Paragraph 3
• ^[3] (About Amazon / Amazon India) – Paragraph 1, Paragraph 4, Paragraph 5, Paragraph 6
• ^[4] (IBEF) – Paragraph 2, Paragraph 3
• ^[5] (Reuters) – Paragraph 7
• ^[6] (Reuters) – Paragraph 2, Paragraph 7
• ^[7] (Reuters) – Paragraph 3, Paragraph 7

Source: Fuse Wire Services