Ashwini Vaishnaw Breaks Down India’s Game Plan for AI, Chips, and Inclusive Growth at Davos
- Joydeep Chakraborty
- Jan 24
- 5 min read
At Davos 2026, Ashwini Vaishnaw positioned India as a global AI and semiconductor powerhouse, redefining economic and technology leadership.
While the world debates the future of AI and semiconductors, India showed it has already built the foundation, and Davos was the showcase. From snow-covered Swiss peaks to boardrooms of global tech giants, Union Minister for Electronics and Information Technology Ashwini Vaishnaw made India’s vision for growth, innovation, and inclusion impossible to ignore at the World Economic Forum (WEF) 2026.
Far from a routine diplomatic exercise, India’s presence underscored its ambition to influence global economic narratives, shape technological norms, and demonstrate resilience amid geopolitical uncertainty and supply-chain realignments. Vaishnaw’s interventions positioned India not just as a fast-growing market, but as a country ready to lead in AI, semiconductors, and digital public infrastructure.
Davos: India’s Stage for Strategic Influence
For India, Davos is where economic priorities, technological leadership, and geopolitical strategy converge, and not just a networking forum. This year, the country leveraged the platform to articulate a coherent, long-term vision of a stable, reform-driven economy, a trusted value-chain partner, and a global rule-shaper in emerging technologies.
Behind India’s confident global pitch lies a decade of structural reforms that have inconspicuously reshaped the country’s economic fundamentals. Policies that once seemed incremental, from easing foreign investment norms to modernising taxation, now form the backbone of India’s credibility in global markets. Vaishnaw’s Davos message was clear that India’s economic transformation is neither fragile nor temporary but a structural reality that continues to attract investment and partnerships.
Davos also provided the stage for India to set the tone and shape the very grammar of global conversations, signalling not just participation but leadership in defining the rules of the emerging world order. By engaging in panels on AI, semiconductors, and economic resilience, India made the case that it is ready to influence global norms rather than react to them.
Economic Resilience Amid Global Uncertainty
Vaishnaw highlighted India’s robust growth outlook, projecting 6–8% real GDP growth and 10–13% nominal growth over the next five years. What makes this remarkable are the structural drivers behind them: sustained investment in physical, digital, and social infrastructure; deep regulatory reforms; and continuous improvements in the ease of doing business.
He pointed out that these reforms have positioned India on a clear path toward becoming the world’s third-largest economy. Even as global trade faces tariff pressures, supply-chain disruptions, and geopolitical tensions, India’s democratic institutions, policy stability, and long-term reform continuity underpin investor confidence. Vaishnaw shared that global investors repeatedly cited these factors as reasons for sustained engagement, which are a concrete signal that India is seen as a safe, predictable, long-term investment destination.
This confidence is not abstract. India’s domestic initiatives, such as streamlined tax regimes, simplified company registration processes, and sector-specific policy incentives, have already produced measurable results. Infrastructure expansion projects, ranging from ports and highways to smart cities and digital connectivity, are creating the backbone for the next decade of growth.
Artificial Intelligence: India’s Bold Global Claim
Technology, particularly AI, formed the centrepiece of India’s narrative at Davos. Vaishnaw rejected the notion that India belongs to a “second tier” of AI economies, asserting that India ranks among global leaders in readiness, talent, and digital infrastructure.
He outlined India’s end-to-end AI strategy, covering applications, foundational models, computing infrastructure, semiconductor chips, and energy systems. Importantly, India’s approach prioritises real-world deployment, scale, and inclusion. Rather than focusing solely on elite research labs or experimental use cases, AI is being directed toward sectors with tangible societal impact, like healthcare, education, agriculture, governance, and public service delivery.
At Davos, Vaishnaw unveiled plans for the India AI Impact Summit in New Delhi, emphasising three pillars: impact, accessibility, and safety. This was a public commitment to making AI inclusive for India and the Global South. The summit will feature global political and technology leaders, major investment announcements, and the rollout of India’s sovereign AI models.
India’s approach draws inspiration from its Unified Payments Interface (UPI), a digital payments system that now handles billions of transactions daily. Vaishnaw highlighted that just as UPI created a scalable, inclusive, and secure infrastructure for financial transactions, India aims to replicate this model in AI by building a framework that is accessible, affordable, and safe.
Semiconductors: The Heart of Technology Sovereignty
No technology ambition is complete without control over its hardware foundations, and India made it clear that chips are now central to its strategic calculus.
Vaishnaw emphasised the depth of India’s startup ecosystem, which now comprises nearly 200,000 startups, making it one of the world’s top three startup hubs. Among these, 24 startups are actively designing semiconductor chips, and 18 have already secured venture capital funding. This is a concrete indication that India is nurturing deep-tech talent capable of tackling one of the most capital-intensive and complex industries globally.
India’s semiconductor roadmap is precise: first master 28nm–90nm nodes, which power EVs, automobiles, defense systems, telecom equipment, and consumer electronics, and then progress to advanced nodes such as 7nm by 2030 and 3nm by 2032, in collaboration with global partners like IBM. Vaishnaw explained that mastering these nodes will not only satisfy domestic demand but also position India as a serious player in global chip manufacturing, capable of supplying key components to strategic sectors worldwide.
This is not just a technical ambition but a strategic one. Control over semiconductors means India can secure critical technology supply chains, reduce dependence on imports, and emerge as a resilient partner in the global economy.
Engaging Global Technology Leaders
India’s message at Davos gained weight not only through speeches but through closed-door conversations with the world’s most influential technology companies.
Vaishnaw met Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian to discuss the $15-billion AI data centre project in Visakhapatnam, which is set to make India one of Asia’s largest AI compute hubs. This initiative highlights India’s ambition to host a global AI ecosystem while deepening collaboration with Indian startups.
Discussions with Meta’s Chief Global Affairs Officer Joel Kaplan focused on combating deepfakes, misinformation, and AI-generated content. Vaishnaw emphasized India’s regulatory approach to these challenges, illustrating that innovation and governance can go hand in hand. These dialogues reinforced that India is not just a large market but a trusted partner shaping the future of technology responsibly.
India as a Trusted Value-Chain Partner
Across panels and private meetings, Vaishnaw framed India as a “trusted value-chain partner” in an increasingly fragmented global economy. He shared that investors consistently highlighted India’s policy predictability, democratic stability, and reform-driven growth as differentiators.
These attributes matter more than ever in a world of supply-chain realignments, tariff wars, and strategic decoupling. India’s combination of scale, talent, stability, and technological ambition positions it as a destination for long-term collaboration, innovation, and investment.
Shaping the Next Technological Era
Taken together, Vaishnaw’s WEF 2026 engagements broadcast a simple but powerful message: India’s growth story is durable, its AI and semiconductor ambitions are globally competitive, and its approach to technology is inclusive, responsible, and forward-looking.
By linking domestic initiatives such as the AI Impact Summit with international partnerships, India is shaping the rules, infrastructure, and frameworks that will define the next era.
Amid the snow-covered corridors of Davos, India’s message that growth without credibility is fragile and technology without inclusion is incomplete resonated as a guiding philosophy, one that could shape the next chapter of global development.
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