Earlier this year, when AIM spoke to Lenovo’s Infrastructure Solutions Group (ISG) leadership team, we were certain that Lenovo would be fuelling India’s hyperscaler ambitions. That prediction couldn’t have been more accurate.
The global tech leader has announced its full-stack portfolio, which is completely ‘Made in India’.
The company inaugurated its state-of-the-art research and development lab in Bengaluru, making it the fourth city to host an infrastructure R&D lab globally, after Raleigh, Beijing, and Taipei. In total, the company operates 18 R&D labs.
“We spent over $2 billion on R&D, a growth of almost 50% year on year. One in every four employees are in our research and development [team], and the reason I’m calling that out is that it’s the core of the company,” said Amit Luthra, managing director, ISG, Lenovo India, at the launch of the AI Lab at Lenovo’s Bengaluru campus.
The company also revealed its AI server manufacturing plans, announcing that AI-enabled GPU servers will be built right here in India. As many as 50,000 enterprise AI servers with 2400 high-end GPU units will power local and global markets.
“Today, the government has committed 10,000+ GPU-strong ecosystem in public-private partnership to ensure that these AI workloads get the horsepower [needed] to run these technologies. Now with this, it’s very important to see how Lenovo is actually grabbing this opportunity, and most importantly, helping organisations as they move ahead in this AI transformation journey,” said Luthra.
India for the World
“I think it’s a great opportunity for us to actually build the lab over here. It’s no secret that there’s a lot of innovation and great resources in India,” said Sumir Bhatia, president, Asia Pacific, ISG at Lenovo, in an exclusive interaction with AIM on the sidelines of the lab launch.
Bhatia explains that the lab isn’t just for India – it has a global focus. He believes it will be part of a larger billion-dollar project and will work with other labs that specialise in different areas, also ensuring that this approach allows all labs to collaborate and contribute to a global network.
The collaboration paves way for further partnerships as well. “We are very globally tied in with the other design centres. So, we complement some of the areas, like some of the high-speed and power integrity stuff, which we focus on. We work with the other centres as well. So, it works out beautifully,” Satish Pratapneni, director, system dev at Lenovo, told AIM.
He emphasised that the company does not take a one-sided approach. When it comes to full-fledged capabilities, they believe they have a lot to offer on the other side as well. He also highlighted why India’s growing technical expertise is taking centre stage.
Inside Lenovo’s new R&D lab in Bengaluru
Smarter AI for All
The company has been going strong in its focus on building an end-to-end solution for AI infrastructure, from servers to PCs. It not only posted strong revenues in the recent quarterly report but also attributed 47% of it to non-PC revenue.
The AI server manufacturing unit in Puducherry will be Lenovo’s fifth manufacturing hub in the world, following USA, Mexico, Brazil, and Hungary.
All this growth is also intertwined with a number of strategic partnerships. Top AI player, NVIDIA, has been a key collaborator for Lenovo. In October last year, the two companies revealed their partnership and expansion plans aimed at making generative AI more accessible to enterprises.
Bhatia stressed that partnering with industry giants runs deep in their ecosystem. “It’s in our DNA to make sure that we’re partnering with the best, because this is what will bring solutions to our customers. So, whether it’s NVIDIA, Red Hat, Nutanix, Intel, or AMD, we’ve got the whole ecosystem and are building platforms and solutions around that,” he said.
Lenovo has over 60 AI solution providers globally, and has delivered more than 165 solutions.
Meanwhile, the company is focusing on building skilled resources from the ground up, and investing in academia too. Discussions are underway with schools, including second and first-year programs. The goal is to engage more with institutions to train the trainers and embed the desired skills from the start.
AI specialists is another area of investment, “We’ve got over 400 AI specialists who know AI end-to-end,” said Bhatia.
