- Blackstone and co-investors agreed to invest $1.2 billion in Indian AI platform Neysa
- Up to $600 million will come from Blackstone-linked equity funds, with $600 million in debt
- Neysa plans to deploy over 20,000 GPUs to support India's AI infrastructure and digital growth
Blackstone, as well as a group of co-investors, have entered into an agreement to invest in Neysa, an Indian artificial intelligence-oriented cloud platform. The entities have enabled a $1.2 billion capital raise to scale the country's digital infrastructure, Blackstone confirmed in a press release.
The deal includes up to $600 million in equity capital from private equity funds affiliated with Blackstone and its partners. In lieu of this equity, Neysa plans to secure an additional $600 million in debt financing. Some of the other key equity participants include Teachers' Venture Growth, TVS Capital, 360 ONE Assets and Nexus Ventures.
Founded in 2023, Neysa is a Mumbai-based firm which provides GPU-based AI infrastructure designed to help enterprises and government entities train and deploy AI workloads. Thanks to the fresh capital, the company will be able to deploy more than 20,000 GPUs across India, thus supporting the 'India AI Mission'.
"This investment reinforces Blackstone's focus on backing the essential ‘picks and shovels' of AI globally," said Amit Dixit, Head of Asia Private Equity at Blackstone. He noted that India remains a key market for the firm's digital infrastructure theme.
Neysa has a flagship platform called Velocis, which offers specialised services for generative AI performance optimisation and security. The company serves a diverse set of client bases, including financial services, healthcare and public sectors.
The partnership between Neysa and Blackstone aims to establish India as a globally relevant AI compute destination and comes against the backdrop of the India AI Impact Summit, which kicks off in New Delhi on Monday.
The event is headlined by the presence of a myriad of world leaders, global tech CEOs and Indian business leaders, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi set to inaugurate the summit.
OpenAI's Sam Altman, Google's Sundar Pichai and Bill Gates are some of the marquee guests, although Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang pulled out of the event at the last minute. He will be replaced by a high-ranking Nvidia delegate.
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