IBM partners with BharatGen to advance AI adoption in India with language-based models to bolster digital inclusion as it extends to critical sectors.

IBM and BharatGen have announced a strategic partnership to accelerate artificial intelligence (AI) adoption in India, emphasizing sovereign multimodal and large language models (LLMs) in the country's cultural and linguistic diversity.

Together, the partnership delivers on IBM's capabilities in data governance and model training, combined with BharatGen's goal to build inclusive AI systems that are India-centric. The initiative will cover different sectors: education, healthcare, agriculture, banking, and citizen services.

IBM and BharatGen will create templates for Indic applications, create demonstrations, and design specific applications based on IBM Watsonx and Red Hat OpenShift AI. The partners also will have scalable data pipelines with Indic-specific functionality and introduce governance frameworks of responsible AI.

According to Sandip Patel, the managing director of IBM India and South Asia, the partnership is meant to develop open and trusted AI that brings meaningful change in sectors. BharatGen, a company located in the Technology Innovation Hub at IIT Bombay and supported by the Department of Science and Technology, is expected to contribute to the second stage of the IndiaAI Mission as well.

One of the partnership objectives is to increase digital equity, making AI models more inclusive of underserved Indian languages and dialects and enabling more individuals to engage with them. IBM and BharatGen come together and will strengthen the AI ecosystem and talent pool in India, as well as spur innovation to meet the needs of the nation and businesses.