MC EXCLUSIVE India’s IT firms must do something dramatic by 2030 amid AI disruption: Vinod Khosla

Vinod Khosla, founder and partner of Khosla Ventures

• Vinod Khosla urges India's IT firms to reinvent for AI era
• AI advances driven by talent and competition, says Khosla
• India well placed to provide global AI expertise

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Venture capitalist and tech billionaire Vinod Khosla has said India’s IT services companies will need to reinvent themselves in a significant way by the end of the decade as artificial intelligence reshapes the global technology landscape.

Speaking to Moneycontrol at the India AI Summit, Khosla said he is looking at a 2030 timeframe and believes India’s IT firms will have to do “something dramatically different” to stay relevant amid AI’s growing influence.

Khosla said the rapid advances in artificial intelligence are being driven by strong talent and intense competition among leading players. “OpenAI is doing extremely well because they have great talent,” he said, adding, “I think all the major models will do well and they will leapfrog each other every few months.”

He noted that both consumer and enterprise segments will witness substantial progress as AI capabilities evolve. At the same time, he emphasised that his investment approach remains founder-focused. “We rely on entrepreneurs to reach out to us, we don’t source deals,” he said, adding, “We don’t have rules — it has to be a great founder operating in a great market.”

Highlighting India’s potential in the AI space, Khosla said, “There’s lot of opportunity in India,” and stressed that the world needs more AI expertise, something India is well placed to provide.

On the concept of sovereign AI, he said it is “a really good idea,” noting that he has invested in Sarvam. He also described Emergent as “one of the fastest growing companies I’ve ever seen.”

Referring to the challenges of deploying AI at scale, Khosla said Nandan Nilekani is right in pointing out that not everything is easily deployable today.

Expressing hope for India’s technology services leaders, he added, “Hope Infosys becomes an AI services company all over the world.”

Khosla’s remarks come at a time when India’s IT industry is grappling with slowing traditional outsourcing growth and rising pressure to integrate AI-led capabilities into its core offerings.