Google announced that based on third-party evaluations, the Google Play and Android ecosystem generated ₹5.3 lakh crore ($60 billion) in revenue for app publishers and the wider economy in India in 2025, representing 28% growth from 2024. According to reports from Business Standard, this significant revenue figure underscores the substantial economic impact of Google's platform ecosystem in the Indian market. The company highlighted this achievement at Google I/O Connect India 2026 in Bengaluru as part of its broader AI expansion strategy. The company also revealed that 91% of surveyed Play developers using Google AI tools reported revenue benefits, while 76% of adults expressed interest in using AI to build applications through natural language. To support this growing demand, Google is expanding its Google Play Academy curriculum to reach 10,000 developers in partnership with the governments of Rajasthan, Odisha and Madhya Pradesh, helping developers build, launch and scale AI-powered applications.
Google unveiled comprehensive enterprise AI, cybersecurity and education initiatives at Google I/O Connect India 2026, positioning India as a proving ground for the next phase of artificial intelligence. As reported by Business Standard, the company announced the Gemini 3.5 Flash model availability to Indian businesses with in-country machine learning processing, expanding its push on data sovereignty. The company is now enabling enterprises, including regulated industries and government agencies, to run Gemini on Google Distributed Cloud from data centres in India, allowing AI applications to operate entirely within their own infrastructure without relying on the public internet. This offering is specifically aimed at customers with data localisation and compliance requirements. According to Google India Country Manager Preeti Lobana, the company's strategy focuses on supporting India with a "full-stack approach" that combines computing infrastructure, AI models, developer tools and partnerships with government, academia and industry. Manish Gupta, senior director for India and Asia-Pacific at Google DeepMind, emphasized that the ultimate metric of AI progress isn't just model parameters, but also in the positive transformation it enables, noting that India is championing AI adoption across every tier of the economy.
Google announced two initiatives aimed at expanding access to advanced AI skills in India, with one programme bringing Google DeepMind's AI Research Foundations curriculum - a free, 56-hour course designed to teach participants how to build and fine-tune large language models and conduct advanced AI research. According to Business Standard, the programme will be available through Google's Skills platform and expanded through partnerships with IT industry body Nasscom and the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru, to reach institutions across the country. Participants can earn Google Cloud skill badges and certificates after completing the programme. Separately, AVPN will work with local partners to deliver the curriculum to learners through the Google.org APAC AI Opportunity Fund. Seshu Ajjarapu, senior director of applied AI at Google DeepMind, highlighted the company's advantage in its "full-stack approach" across the AI stack, from infrastructure including tensor processing units (TPUs) to foundation models, open models such as Gemma, domain-specific models including MedGemma, and enterprise AI tools.
Google launched ATL Saathi, a Gemini-powered assistant for teachers developed with the Atal Innovation Mission, which will be introduced in 100 schools this year with plans to eventually reach the 10,000 schools covered by the Atal Tinkering Labs programme. As reported by Business Standard, the tool is designed for teachers working in Atal Tinkering Labs and is intended to help educators prepare lessons and hands-on classroom activities. Researchers at AIIMS Delhi are using Google's open-source MedGemma AI models to develop India-specific tools for leprosy and sexual and reproductive health, with the resulting models to be made available to the Indian developer ecosystem. Dr Somesh Gupta of AIIMS noted that MedGemma's multimodal capabilities have already delivered encouraging results in dermatology screening and expressed confidence in expanding its use to leprosy and sexual and reproductive health. The company expanded Gemini Live to support 25 Indian languages and dialects, including Sanskrit, Bhojpuri and Maithili.
Google is expanding access to Sec-Gemini v3, its AI-powered cybersecurity agent, to selected government and enterprise testers, including Flipkart, as it seeks to address security risks posed by agentic AI. According to Business Standard, the system is designed to analyse complex security information and assist security teams in investigating cyber incidents more quickly. The company is also open-sourcing CAPSEM (Capabilities Security for Agents), a secure runtime environment that isolates each AI agent inside its own virtual machine, reducing the risk that a compromised agent could affect an entire system. Google announced research partnerships with IIT Delhi and IIT Madras focused on agentic AI safety and threat detection, demonstrating the company's commitment to addressing emerging security challenges in the AI ecosystem. The company is also promoting security standards such as Device Bound Session Credentials (DBSC) and protocols for secure AI-driven financial transactions.
The event highlighted how Indian companies are already applying Google's AI models across different industries, with Policybazaar reporting a 50% increase in policy conversions and a 2.6-fold rise in advisor calls after rebuilding parts of its insurance platform using Google's AI technologies. Travel platform redBus demonstrated a conversational booking assistant that allows users to search for bus journeys in Hindi and other Indian languages through natural language conversations. Around 1,500 developers attended this year's Google I/O Connect India, where several Indian startups, including Adya.AI, VideoSDK, Sivi, Superjoin, Knit, PolicyBazaar, Emergent and RedBus, demonstrated products built using Google's AI models. Other companies including Emergent, Adya, VideoSDK, Sivi, Superjoin and Knit showcased applications spanning software development, voice AI, creative design, financial modelling and enterprise integrations. Google also announced it will expand Google Play Academy training to 10,000 developers through partnerships with the governments of Rajasthan, Odisha and Madhya Pradesh, helping developers use the latest AI technologies while learning how to build and scale applications and games.
