Addressing Tech Mahindra’s AGM, the chairman argued that enterprises need partners who understand AI transformation is a business and talent challenge, not just a technology project
Anand Mahindra used Tech Mahindra’s 39th Annual General Meeting to confront head-on what he called the elephant in the room: the widespread prediction that artificial intelligence will hollow out India’s IT services industry. His answer was unambiguous. The role of IT services will not diminish, he told shareholders. It will change, and in many ways become more important.
The Smartphone Analogy
Mahindra gave an example in order to put things into perspective. According to him, smartphones are crucial because of the applications and connection that help them to function effectively. The same applies to AI; Tech Mahindra is able to provide this layer that transforms the basic technology into a tool that has a real meaning for the business. In the absence of this option, according to Mahindra, AI does not have a context.
What Enterprises Actually Need
The chairman was clear that deploying AI into enterprise environments is considerably more complex than adopting the technology itself. What will differentiate companies, he said, is their own data, workflows, domain judgement, and institutional knowledge. Tech Mahindra’s role is to help clients preserve and leverage that advantage through platforms and solutions that sit around the model rather than replacing it. He described the company’s Project Helix initiative as central to this vision, through which Vector Squads combine human expertise with AI agents to deliver transformation grounded in each client’s specific context.
India Must Be a Creator, Not Just a Consumer
Mahindra extended the argument to the national level. India cannot be content as a consumer of intelligence built elsewhere, he said, invoking what he called denial-driven innovation. When India was denied access to Cray supercomputing systems in the 1980s, C-DAC built the PARAM machine indigenously within three years and was exporting it within a decade. That same instinct, he argued, must now be directed toward Sovereign AI, building and governing critical AI systems on India’s own terms through indigenous capability and trusted collaboration rather than isolation or dependence.
Tech Mahindra’s selection under the India AI Mission, he noted, is a responsibility the company takes seriously.
