Meta officially opened its India Artificial Intelligence Research Centre in Hyderabad on Tuesday, establishing one of its largest AI research facilities outside the United States. The centre, housed in a newly constructed 200,000 square foot campus in the HITEC City technology corridor, has an initial workforce of 500 AI researchers and engineers focused on multilingual natural language processing, computer vision for augmented reality, and responsible AI systems. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg attended the inauguration via video link from the Meta headquarters in Menlo Park.
Meta India Head Ajit Mohan said the Hyderabad centre will play a pivotal role in building AI systems that serve the billions of users Meta products reach in India and across the Global South. The company plans to grow the centre to 2,000 employees by 2027 through a combination of hiring fresh graduates from IITs and NITs and experienced professionals from the Indian AI research community. The centre will also partner with IISc Bengaluru and IIT Madras on joint research programmes. Telangana Chief Minister A. Revanth Reddy called the investment a major boost for Hyderabad position as a global technology hub.