New Delhi, June 23, 2025
— In a defining moment for India's technological and strategic future, the Government of India today announced the launch of its first homegrown artificial intelligence chip — Aatman AI. The unveiling ceremony was held at the India Tech Innovation Summit in New Delhi and attended by key stakeholders from the defense, science, education, and tech startup sectors.
The chip was developed jointly by the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) and Bharat Silicon Labs (BSL), under the ambitious Make in India – AI Vision 2040 program.
🔧 Technical Specifications:
- Name: Aatman AI
- Architecture: 5nm
- Performance: 80 TOPS (Trillion Operations Per Second)
- Energy Efficiency: 20% lower power consumption than equivalent global chips
- Memory: 64GB HBM4
- Fabrication Partner: Semiconductor Lab India (Mohali)
- First Use Case: Military-grade drones, smart surveillance grids, and AI supercomputers
🇮🇳 Why It Matters:
Until now, India has been heavily reliant on foreign chipsets from companies like NVIDIA, AMD, and Intel to power AI applications. The launch of Aatman AI changes that, enabling:
- Strategic Self-Reliance: Critical for national security, especially in defense AI.
- Cost-Efficiency for Startups: Local chip production reduces hardware import costs.
- Job Creation: More than 15,000 skilled jobs expected in semiconductor research and development by 2026.
- AI Ecosystem Boost: Integration with education (AI labs), healthcare (AI diagnostics), and transport (autonomous systems).
🗣️ What Leaders Said:
“This chip is not just about silicon and code. It is about India’s vision to lead in AI innovation. We’re building not just for India, but for the world,” said PM Narendra Modi, addressing the summit virtually.
“The Aatman AI chip shows the potential of Indian engineers and scientists. It's a proud moment,” said Dr. Meenakshi Iyer, Chief Scientist at BSL.
🌐 Global Impact:
Technology analysts have praised Aatman AI’s specs, with many comparing it to NVIDIA Orin, Google TPU, and Intel Gaudi2 — all global leaders in AI hardware. The chip’s capability to operate on both edge and cloud environments adds to its flexibility for diverse use cases.
Countries in Southeast Asia and Africa have already shown interest in licensing the chip for their local AI initiatives.
📆 Rollout Plan:
- Q3 2025 – Sample distributions to government labs and IITs
- Q4 2025 – Mass production and integration in Indian AI products
- Q1 2026 – Global export phase begins via Digital India Export Cell