Speaking exclusively to NDTV Profit, ace investor Shankar Sharma has reined in on the global Indian startup ecosystem while defending Indian IT companies such as Infosys, Wipro and TCS, among others.
When asked about India losing out on the global artificial intelligence race and people laying blame on the Indian IT companies for the same, Sharma argued that these IT firms have done an excellent job in building the nation and it would have been unfair to expect them to lead the next frontier of AI in India.
“I feel Indian IT companies have received a lot of unfair criticism. On the face of it, they were set out to do bodyshop model. Did they do that well or not? That’s an unequivocal yes. They transformed India and did far better than even they had expected,” he said.
He went on to criticise the rest of India’s tech ecosystem, arguing that it is unfair to lay the blame on the big IT companies for losing the race on AI.
“On top of everything the IT companies have done, you expect them to bring AI models,. Then will the remaining 150 crore people just sit there and twiddle their thumb?” he argued.
Where Sharma Is Investing
On his own portfolio, Sharma was notably cool on some of the most hyped names in global tech. “Valuations SpaceX is asking for is crazy; no chance of investing in them. Their investment theory looks like Dennison’s poetry,” he said.
He said he has no positions in Anthropic, Nvidia or OpenAI either, preferring instead to ride the semiconductor wave through TSMC. “Not investing in Anthropic, Nvidia or OpenAI; I have TSMC. Semiconductor has been a big driver of my profits,” he said.
Closer to home, Sharma flagged the infrastructure layer of the AI economy as his preferred theme – what he called the “plumbers of AI.”
“Power equipment sector looks good to me; cabling, optical fibres are a good theme. There is still headroom for growth in data center-related stocks in India,” he concluded.
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