Krutrim to build and launch first AI chip in two years

Ola founder Bhavish Aggarwal’s artificial intelligence (AI) startup Krutrim said it would roll out its first AI chip, Bodhi 1, by 2026.

Aggarwal said the Bengaluru-headquartered firm works on four first-generation chips: Bodhi 1 and Bodhi 2 for AI, Sarv 1 for general computing, and Ojas for Edge computing.

The Bodhi-II range of chips is expected to be launched in 2028. Krutrim has announced a strategic tie-up with global chip-makers Arm and Untether AI.

“India has a unique opportunity to emerge as a global powerhouse in future technologies like AI. With 20% of the world’s data and a vast tech talent pool, India is well-positioned to lead the AI revolution,” Aggarwal said at the Ola Sankalp 2024 event in Bengaluru.

Krutrim is planning to expand its data center capacity significantly, aiming to increase it from 20 megawatts to 1 gigawatts by 2028 to cater to the growing demand for AI and cloud computing services, he said.

In January, the Aggarwal-founded AI startup became India’s first AI unicorn after securing $50 million in funding from investors led by Matric Partners India. A unicorn is a startup worth at least $1 billion.

Focused on building the complete AI computing stack, Krutrim had closed its first round of funding inequity at a valuation of $1 billion.

Krutrim, which means “artificial” in Sanskrit, is a family of large language models (LLMs), including Krutrim base and Krutrim Pro. These models will have multimodal, more extensive knowledge capabilities and many other technical advancements for inference.

The company said that trained on over 2 trillion tokens, Krutrim performs well on multiple LLM evaluation benchmarks.

Earlier this year, Aggarwal made headlines when he migrated Ola’s workload from Microsoft Azure to Krutrim Cloud.

Among the other announcements, Giving a further boost to the Indian EV ecosystem, Ola Electric Chairman and CEO Bhavish Aggarwal launched the “Bharat” battery cell, an indigenous 4680 cell developed by Ola Electric. Adding that his company owns 70 patents related to this technology, Aggarwal said, “we didn’t import the tech, we built it ourselves.” The Bharat cell is five times more energy dense than the currently used 2170 cells in Ola scooters, which promises faster charging, contributing to a more convenient user experience.

On the electric mobility front, Ola Electric launched its latest range of electric two-wheelers, the Roadster series, in India at its Sankalp 2024 event on the nation’s Independence Day. Aggarwal launched three new electric vehicle (EV) bikes: Roadster Pro, X and Roadster.

Following the series of announcements, the shares of Ola Electric Mobility jumped 20% to end at Rs133. The SoftBank-backed firm is valued at Rs58,558 core ($7 billion), with a valuation increasing 75% above the $4 billion (Rs33,522 crore) it sought in its Rs6,146 crore initial public offering. The shares were priced at Rs76 in the IPO and were subscribed four times.