Alphabet-owned Google on Friday announced that it would invest an amount of $3 billion in order to set up a data centre in Indiana and expand sites in Virginia. A boom in artificial intelligence (AI) has shot up the demand for cloud computing, and it has prompted big tech companies to expand their data centre capacity. On Thursday, Amazon's cloud computing arm committed $11 billion toward new data centres in Indiana, US, and creating 1,000 jobs.
Google will be spending an amount of around $2 billion for the Indiana campus at Fort Wayne, and it will spend $1 billion more in order to expand three existing data centre campuses in Virginia. Google on Friday also announced a $75-million Google AI Opportunity Fund to train Americans on AI skills.
Google's Focus On Training
The initiative targets the training of one million Americans from diverse backgrounds in essential AI skills, all provided free of charge. Google.org is partnering with nonprofit organizations, educational institutions, and various sectors to make AI training programs accessible to everyone.
As a component of this effort, Google is introducing the Google AI Essentials course, which has been created by Grow with Google in collaboration with AI experts from different teams within the organisation. This course is structured to impart foundational AI skills that individuals can use in their everyday lives and professions, without necessitating a degree or prior experience.
The company in a blog post said, "The information that we deliver to people around the world — through Google Search, YouTube, Maps and our many other products — is supported by our infrastructure. Data centers keep our products and services running around the clock and around the world, and power Google’s AI innovation."
Google CEO Sundar Pichai in a post on X said, “Today we’re announcing a $3B investment to expand our data center campuses in Virginia and build our newest data center in Fort Wayne, Indiana. We’re excited to support jobs and local communities across 26 US states.”