Indian firms lead in AI adoption but 45% lack solid foundation: Hitachi Vantara Report

Despite strong interest in AI, many organizations are not fully prepared to support it with the right data infrastructure. While 55% of Indian companies have reached mature stages of data readiness, the remaining 45% still rely on weaker systems, making AI projects harder to scale and more expensive to run.

The gap is even clearer in day-to-day operations, with only 32% of organizations having systems that allow them to expand AI use in a stable and cost-effective way, according to Hitachi Vantara’s 2025 State of Data Infrastructure Report.

Indian companies are adopting artificial intelligence faster than most of the world. A new survey of over 1,200 business and IT leaders across 15 countries found that 89% of Indian organizations have either widely adopted AI or made it central to how they work. Globally, that number is just 69%.

What's more, 63% of Indian companies say they're getting good returns on their AI investments, better than the global average, suggesting most have moved past the experimental phase and are actually using AI to run their businesses.

AI And Beyond

But, as these companies pile on more AI projects, the systems needed to support them are getting messier and harder to manage. The survey found 87% of Indian companies say their data infrastructure is getting more complex, fast. That's higher than the 80% reporting the same problem worldwide.

"Indian enterprises have moved well beyond experimenting with AI and are now focused on delivering measurable business outcomes at scale," said Hemant Tiwari, Managing Director of Hitachi Vantara India & SAARC. "What's becoming clear is that as adoption accelerates, infrastructure complexity is rising just as fast."

The numbers back this up. AI spending in India is set to jump 75.6% over the next two years, outpacing the global increase of 70.3%. The amount of data companies need to store will grow by nearly three-quarters. Four in ten Indian organizations now handle between 50 and 200 petabytes of data, compared to three in ten globally, the report said.

Data security has become a big problem with two-thirds of Indian companies say keeping data safe is their biggest challenge with AI, making India one of the most security-focused markets globally, according to the report.

Companies are trying to get a handle on this with the survey showing that 81% have leadership teams with clear AI plans, 79% have dedicated AI teams, and 77% have set specific goals for what they want AI to achieve. All these figures are higher than global averages.

According to the report, despite the growing pains, three-quarters of Indian companies say their AI projects are working well. Almost none reported complete failures. Companies are mainly using AI to automate routine work, dig up business insights, and help people make better decisions faster.

When AI does work, it's usually because companies have good quality data to feed it, watch how it performs, get employees on board, and have skilled people running it, the report found.

The talent problem is real. More than half of companies say finding skilled workers is one of their biggest obstacles. To get around this, 76% are bringing in outside help or partners to run parts of their AI work, more than the global average.

"The real bottleneck for AI isn't the models, it's when the data backbone lags behind," said Sanjay Agrawal, CTO and Head of Pre-sales for India and SAARC region at Hitachi Vantara. "This report highlights that as Indian organizations operate at higher data volumes across hybrid environments, complexity and security risks increase rapidly."

The survey shows 71% Indian companies say their machine learning operations are strong, compared to 63% globally. And 89% actively track how their AI is performing, versus 85% worldwide.

Still, the 45% of companies working with weaker foundations face a tougher road. Without better systems for managing data, their AI projects will cost more and be harder to grow.

The report suggests companies that want to stay ahead need to act now. Organizations should focus on modernizing their data foundations early, investing in automation to handle growing complexity, and building stronger governance frameworks.

The companies that do this can keep their AI momentum going without running into problems as they scale up, according to the findings, the report said.

The report is based on responses from 1,244 business and IT leaders across 15 countries, including 104 from India. Hitachi Vantara is the data infrastructure arm of Hitachi Ltd.