India's Ministry of Electronics and IT (Meti) acts as a promoter and facilitator for the AI sector, not a traditional regulator. It uses "policy nudges" and strategic programs like the India AI Mission to coordinate and foster collaboration between private companies, academia, and research organizations.
The "Genesis Mission" aims to use national labs' data and supercomputers for AI-driven science. This initiative marks a potential strategic shift away from the prevailing tech belief that breakthroughs like AGI will emerge exclusively from private corporations, reasserting a key role for government-led R&D in fundamental innovation.
Instead of directly funding AI data centers, India's national AI mission uses a demand-side strategy. It subsidizes compute access for users like startups and researchers, creating a guaranteed market that incentivizes private companies to build and offer compute capacity competitively.
India is taking a measured, "no rush" approach to AI governance. The strategy is to first leverage and adapt existing legal frameworks—like the IT Act for deepfakes and data protection laws for privacy—rather than creating new, potentially innovation-stifling AI-specific legislation.
Instead of competing to build sovereign AI stacks from the chip up, India's strategic edge is in applying commoditized AI models to its unique, population-scale problems. This leverages the country's deep experience with real-world, large-scale implementation.
The European Union's strategy for leading in AI focuses on establishing comprehensive regulations from Brussels. This approach contrasts sharply with the U.S. model, which prioritizes private sector innovation and views excessive regulation as a competitive disadvantage that stifles growth.
Indian startups are carving a competitive niche by focusing on the AI application layer. Instead of building foundational models, their strength lies in developing and deploying practical AI solutions that solve real-world problems, which is where they can effectively compete on a global scale.
Contrary to the global trend where consumer applications dominate AI usage (70%), India's adoption is heavily skewed towards productive enterprise use (60%). This business-first approach is driven by a large STEM workforce leveraging AI for efficiency gains in sectors like finance and healthcare.
Contrary to their current stance, major AI labs will pivot to support national-level regulation. The motivation is strategic: a single, predictable federal framework is preferable to navigating an increasingly complex and contradictory patchwork of state-by-state AI laws, which stifles innovation and increases compliance costs.
Mark Cuban advocates for a specific regulatory approach to maintain AI leadership. He suggests the government should avoid stifling innovation by over-regulating the creation of AI models. Instead, it should focus intensely on monitoring the outputs to prevent misuse or harmful applications.
For India, "leapfrogging" with AI means overcoming systemic resource shortages. AI acts as a horizontal productivity multiplier, enabling, for example, a limited number of doctors to deliver better healthcare outcomes through AI-powered diagnostics, thus enhancing sectoral capacity without massive infrastructure investment.