As per reports, Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, emphasised the company’s substantial investment in India’s AI talent pool, predominantly through Microsoft Copilot.

Nadella highlighted the influence of tools like Shiksha Copilot, which aim to streamline educational processes and boost student engagement.

Shiksha Copilot is a part of Project VeLLM by Microsoft Research India and leverages generative AI to assist teachers, farmers, and small business owners.

Shiksha Copilot is built on the Microsoft Azure OpenAI Service and integrates with school curriculums and learning objectives, targeting to lessen the burden on teachers and enhance student learning experiences.

Moreover, Nadella expressed enthusiasm for the potential of AI to revolutionise education in India, remarking that the tool significantly reduces the time required for teachers to prepare lesson plans.

Sikshana, an organisation involved in the initiative, said there was a drastic reduction in preparation time from over an hour to just 5-15 minutes, with slight modifications needed by teachers.

The initiative aligns with the broader commitment of Microsoft to upskilling 2 million individuals in India to reinforce the country’s AI talent pool, proclaimed Nadella.

Project VeLLM tries to bridge the digital divide by leveraging Large Language Models (LLMs) to overcome barriers related to language, income, digital literacy, and information access.

During his visit, Nadella also met with Indian developers, reaffirming Microsoft’s dedication to empowering the country’s expanding developer community.

He also emphasised India’s potential as a hub for AI-based product development, citing projections that India will surpass the US to become the largest developer community on GitHub by 2027.

India ranks second among the top 10 global communities contributing to generative AI projects on GitHub.