Cortex DC targets operational readiness for its first facility within 18 months from first shovel, with 51% of its energy planned from green sources
Cortex DC, the AI-first subsidiary of The Chatterjee Group (TCG), a multi-billion-dollar conglomerate, is foraying into the data centre space after careful preparation. Built to serve hyperscalers, cloud service providers and advanced AI workloads, the company plans to develop 2 GW of capacity across India to meet rising demand for high-performance computing driven by AI and cloud adoption.
The platform has been in development over the past several months, and its site, power and partner workstreams are already advanced. Cortex DC is built on three priorities: speed, scale and sustainable power. The company is targeting operational readiness for its first data centre within 18 months of first shovel, an accelerated timeline aimed at meeting growing demand for AI-ready infrastructure, hypercompute capability and data consumption. It also plans to source 51% of its energy from green sources, building renewable energy into its infrastructure strategy from the outset.
With a clear development roadmap, an experienced leadership team and a supporting board already in place, Cortex DC is positioned to deliver large-scale, AI-ready data centre infrastructure. It draws on TCG’s global experience in engineering, energy, technology and large-scale project execution.
Cortex DC reflects TCG’s broader vision of what its Founder and Chairman, Dr. Purnendu Chatterjee, describes as the Intelligence Age, in which computing infrastructure will play a foundational role in economic growth, technological innovation and scientific advancement.
Speaking about Cortex DC, Dr. Purnendu Chatterjee, Founder and Chairman, TCG, said, “Every economic era is built on a foundation. The Industrial Age rested on steel and energy; the Intelligence Age will rest on compute. For three decades, TCG has built knowledge-based businesses through strategic long-term investments, with an overriding focus on value creation. Cortex DC extends that philosophy to the digital backbone of the Intelligence Age. We are building it with speed, at scale and with a commitment to responsible energy, in the belief that India’s economic development will be shaped by the infrastructure it builds today.”
Cortex DC has assembled a leadership team with deep roots in engineering, construction and critical infrastructure. Rahul Sharma, Chief Executive Officer, Cortex DC, brings over 25 years of experience across engineering, construction and digital infrastructure, including extensive data centre experience. He has worked across the spectrum with hyperscalers and colocation players, and has been involved, directly or indirectly, in GW-scale data centre projects across India.
Rahul Sharma, Chief Executive Officer, Cortex DC, said, “Cortex DC is being built in India for the globe, set up to serve both local and global customers. It aims to deliver the scale, resilience, power availability, and connectivity that international enterprises, cloud service providers, and AI innovators demand. Our ambition is to provide globally competitive, AI-ready infrastructure that establishes India as a premier destination for the world’s most demanding compute workloads. We see Cortex DC as a catalyst of India’s emergence as a global AI and digital infrastructure hub.”
Cortex DC’s Supervisory Board is chaired by Vinayak Pai, who has more than 30 years of global engineering and project execution experience. Its members are senior TCG leaders Samik Mukherjee, Jeremy Ghose, Debu Bhattacharya and Sujoy Choudhury, who bring expertise in energy, finance, strategy, technology and industrial development.
Vinayak Pai, Chair of the Board, Cortex DC, added, “Every major leap in economic growth has been carried by infrastructure, from railways and ports to the internet. AI is the next such layer, and India has the talent, the market and the ambition to lead it. Cortex DC is being built as a long-term partner in that journey, bringing global standards of engineering and governance to infrastructure that will anchor India’s digital economy and attract the world’s technology leaders to build here.”
Beyond the development of data centre capacity, Cortex DC projects are poised to contribute to regional economic activity through direct and indirect employment in construction, engineering, supply chains, facility operations and associated services. The company sees its investments as part of the wider infrastructure ecosystem needed to support India’s growing digital economy and attract global technology investment.
With its planned 2 GW capacity, accelerated development approach, established team and focus on green energy, Cortex DC is well placed to establish a significant presence in India’s emerging AI infrastructure market, supporting the next phase of growth in cloud computing, AI adoption and digital services.