Here’s What We Know About Krutrim, India’s First AI Language Model Launched by Ola’s Chief

Ola operates cabs and other services in India, but the company has goals for much more than assembly facilities. Ola chief Bhavish Aggrawal has jumped into the AI bandwagon with one of India’s first indigenous AI models called Krutrim. Ola claims that Krutrim is based on local Indian languages, data and more.

The company wants the country to move away from Western AI products (ChatGPT and Google demonstrated here) as India builds its own AI model. Ola had announced Krutrim (which means artificial in Sanskrit) at a live event on Friday, where Aggrawal spoke proudly about its local talent and what it could bring to the table in the near future.

Krutrim’s interface looks quite simple and user-friendly, which could be one way to attract more people in the country to use the AI chatbot. He also mentioned that the model can understand 20 Indian languages and produce 10 Indian languages including Marathi, Hindi, Telugu, Kannada and Odia.

During the event, the head of Ola presented a quick demo of the AI chatbot, where it performed simple queries such as writing stories, poems and even welcomed guests at the launch site. Krutrim has two models, a basic model and a Pro model, the latter will be launched in the next quarter, Ola announced.

Krutrim was built by training more than 2 trillion tokens, and the company admitted that the AI model is still in beta, which is why tests were limited to basic responses for now. The company also wants to build a full AI stack that includes an AI chip, a resilient AI cloud, an AI model family, and a user-specific application.

Artificial intelligence is undoubtedly the toast of the town these days and the year 2023 will clearly show us the path that AI will take in the coming years. Most tech giants like Google, OpenAI, Microsoft and Meta have entered the AI space with their respective LLM companies, but Ola is a surprising addition to this list, looking to strengthen India’s position and direction in AI along with the government.

However, using complex AI models requires heavy investment, not only in computing power, but also in the funds needed to maintain the applications running through those machines.

OpenAI used Microsoft’s big pockets to develop ChatGPT over the last 12 months, while Google continues to build its AI blueprint with the Gemini series. Ola needs a similar push from investors to keep the PCs running and this is where this Krutrim demo might help in that case.

But only time will tell if Bhavish and Co have a model that can succeed in the long run. AI can’t just be a business model that thrives until the investment flows, it needs a long-term approach to help it evolve and become more than just a language model for consumers and businesses.