Google’s $15 billion AI hub in Visakhapatnam is on track to begin operations in 2028, Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu told Bloomberg in an interview on Wednesday in the port city, pledging uninterrupted power and water supplies despite growing concerns from residents about the strain on resources, Bloomberg reported. He also flagged new data center investments by Blackstone, according to the report.
Google’s April release puts the hub at “nearly 1 GW in a single location”, in the words of Adani Group director Jeet Adani. India’s total data centre capacity was around 1,500 MW in 2025, according to the government’s Digital India release, so by our arithmetic the one Vizag site is about two-thirds of the country’s 2025 total.
Business Pill · Grid Cost Allocation Explained
An evergreen Business Engineer explainer on grid cost allocation: who pays for the new power line a large new user needs. It explains the general idea only and does not discuss Google, Andhra Pradesh or Visakhapatnam.
The key insight: Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu told Bloomberg that Google’s $15 billion Visakhapatnam AI hub is on track to begin operations in 2028, and flagged new data center investments by Blackstone. Google’s April release describes the hub as nearly 1 GW in a single location; by our arithmetic that is about two-thirds of the around 1,500 MW India had in 2025.
Bloomberg’s Ruchi Bhatia reported on 12 November that the state “was taking all precautions into account to meet energy demands for the projects”, Naidu said. Bloomberg describes Naidu as a top ally of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
The part of Bloomberg’s article we could read does not give the size, location or value of the Blackstone investments, or a month in 2028 for the start of operations.
India’s total data centre capacity, about 375 MW in 2020 and around 1,500 MW in 2025 per the government’s Digital India release, against Google’s Visakhapatnam AI hub, described in Google’s 28 April 2026 release as nearly 1 GW in a single location. The two-thirds ratio is our arithmetic.
What Google Has Committed
Google announced the hub on 14 October 2025 as “our largest investment in India to date, totaling approximately $15 billion (USD) over the next five years (2026-2030)”, Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian wrote on Google’s India blog. By our arithmetic, that is about $3 billion a year on average.
Google’s release says the hub will include “a purpose-built data center campus, adding gigawatt-scale compute capacity”, developed with AdaniConneX and Airtel. The blog says Google will be “working with partners to deliver new transmission lines, clean energy generation, and energy storage systems in Andhra Pradesh”.
Naidu said in that release: “We are proud to host India’s first truly gigawatt-scale data center and Google’s first AI hub in India”.
Groundbreaking and Three Campuses
Google broke ground on 28 April 2026 at Tarluvada, its release says, 196 days after the announcement by our count. The release says the project “includes India’s first gigawatt-scale AI hub comprising three data center campuses”, with AdaniConneX and Nxtra by Airtel leading construction of the buildings.
On water, the same release says Google is partnering with Sponge Collaborative on a watershed plan that “addresses existing hydrological stress and coastal ecosystem sensitivities around its data center campuses”. Union IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw referred in it to “three subsea cables landing in Visakhapatnam”.
Milestones as dated by Google’s releases and, for 2028, by Naidu as reported by Bloomberg. Evenly spaced, not to scale.
India’s Capacity, for Scale
The government’s Digital India release says “The total data centre capacity in the country has increased from about 375 MW in 2020 to around 1500 MW by 2025”. By our arithmetic that is a fourfold rise in five years, and the Vizag hub alone, at nearly 1,000 MW, would add about two-thirds of the 2025 total.
The comparison is approximate: the government figure and the Adani description are rounded, and neither source says whether it counts total power or power for IT equipment.
As we read the interview report, the new element is a date: Google’s releases give a 2026-2030 investment period, and Naidu, as reported, places the start of operations in 2028.
As we read Bloomberg’s opening, power and water are the stated pressure points: Naidu pledged uninterrupted supplies, and Bloomberg reports growing concerns from residents about the strain on resources.
As we read Google’s April release, water was already on its list: it describes a watershed plan for existing hydrological stress around the campuses.
Google Cloud release, 28 April 2026, quoting Jeet Adani, Adani Group
“What we are building in Visakhapatnam, nearly 1 GW in a single location, signals that shift”
Three Implications
FOR GOOGLE Its releases commit approximately $15 billion over 2026-2030 for three data center campuses, a subsea gateway and new energy infrastructure with partners.
FOR ANDHRA PRADESH Naidu, as reported by Bloomberg, pledged uninterrupted power and water and said the state was taking all precautions to meet energy demands.
FOR INDIA’S CAPACITY The government’s release puts national data centre capacity at around 1,500 MW in 2025; the Vizag hub alone is described as nearly 1 GW.
The framework argues: “The structural bottleneck isn’t computing, it’s electrons.”
As we read it, Naidu’s pledge of uninterrupted power for a hub described as nearly 1 GW puts that bottleneck at the level of one state government. The framework predates Naidu’s interview and does not discuss Visakhapatnam.
What Is Not Established
We read the opening of Bloomberg’s article, not the full text. The 2028 date is Naidu’s, as reported by Bloomberg; the Google releases we read give 2026-2030 as the investment period. The part we read gives no Blackstone figures and no detail of the state’s power and water plans. We did not contact Google, Blackstone or the Andhra Pradesh government.
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Naidu told Bloomberg that Google’s $15 billion Visakhapatnam hub is on track to begin operations in 2028 and pledged uninterrupted power and water. At nearly 1 GW, by our arithmetic the hub is about two-thirds of the around 1,500 MW of data centre capacity India had in 2025.
A note on sourcing. Naidu’s comments, the 2028 date and the Blackstone mention come from Bloomberg’s 12 November article by Ruchi Bhatia, of which we read the opening part available without a subscription. The investment, campus and water details are from Google’s India blog and Google Cloud releases of 14 October 2025 and 28 April 2026, which we read in full; India’s capacity figures are from the government’s Digital India release.
The two-thirds ratio, the yearly average and the day count are our arithmetic. We did not contact Google, Blackstone or the Andhra Pradesh government.
Gennaro Cuofano is a CRO and tech executive who has worked in AI since late 2015, starting with bringing NLP, natural-language generation, voice and chatbot products to the marketing industry. His background is in law and finance: he holds a Master's degree in Law and an International MBA with an emphasis on corporate finance (LUISS Business School and the University of San Diego, 2012), and worked as a financial analyst at a real-estate investment firm in San Diego and as an assistant controller. His work focuses on business model strategy, business engineering and, more broadly, structural analysis: how companies make money, read from their own filings. He created FourWeekMBA and leads research there and at The Business Engineer, his newsletter on AI and business strategy, with over 95,000 subscribers and more than 1,000 published analyses. His writing has also appeared on Entrepreneur (for example, How to Digitize a Family Business in Europe) and HackerNoon. Find him on LinkedIn and Substack. See how we source.
