India to overtake US to lead GitHub developer community by 2027: Nadella

Microsoft Chief Executive Satya Nadella today said India also holds the 2nd highest number of generative AI projects on GitHub after the United States. In his address to 1,100 developers and tech leaders at the Microsoft AI Tour in Bengaluru, Microsoft Chief Executive Satya Nadella’s said India's developer community plays a crucial role in pioneering cutting-edge solutions with global impact.

Highlighting India's remarkable growth on GitHub, Nadella says with this trajectory, India will surpass the US as the platform's largest developer community by 2027. “India is the fastest-growing market on GitHub, a Microsoft-owned software collaboration and innovation platform, with 13.2 million developers using the platform. It is expected to overtake the US as the largest developer community on GitHub by 2027,” Nadella says.

Nadella also announced the expansion of Microsoft’s ‘Code; Without Barriers’ programme aiming to bridge the gender gap in tech. Through this programme, he says, the company will democratise access to tech skills nationwide. The program was launched in 2021 across nine Asia Pacific (APAC) countries to help close the gender gap in the region’s fast-growing cloud, AI, and digital technology sectors.

“Through ‘Code; Without Barriers’, Microsoft will provide skilling and certification to 75,000 women developers in India in 2024,” the tech giant states.

Additionally, Microsoft's commitment to India's tech ecosystem was underscored by its ‘ADVANTA(I)GE INDIA’ initiative, targeting to provide AI skilling opportunities to 2 million individuals by 2025, the company adds.

At Nadella’s Bengaluru AI Tour, projects leveraging Microsoft technologies were showcased, including ‘Sarvam AI’ language models that offer Indic language support, ‘Shiksha Copilot' developed by the Sikshana Foundation and Microsoft Research India for educational enhancement and is currently being deployed in about 30 rural and urban schools in Bengaluru. “The Open Healthcare Network has helped manage 581 hospitals, oversee 20,712 hospital beds, attend to 362,349 patients, and facilitate over 500 million consultations in India with the support of 1,884 health workers,” Microsoft says.

Nadella, who kicked off his India visit on Wednesday, said the country is uniquely positioned to make the promise of AI a reality. He added that Microsoft was committed to partnering broadly across the public and private sectors to help close the nation's AI skills gap and create new opportunities throughout the country.

According to Microsoft’s recent Work Trend Index, around 90% of Indian leaders say the people they hire will require new skills to prepare them for the growth of AI. “Furthermore, 78 percent of Indian workers say they don’t have the right AI capabilities to complete their current work,” the company says.