Yotta Data Services is actively pursuing a significant capital injection, aiming to raise $1.5 billion by the end of the current fiscal year (FY27). This ambitious fundraising endeavor will involve a combination of private-equity funding and a planned initial public offering (IPO) in India. The exact size of the public market offering will ultimately be determined by the success of the pre-IPO fundraising efforts.
The Mumbai-based data center company is targeting the fourth quarter of the fiscal year for its IPO, contingent on receiving approval from the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi). While the IPO itself could potentially secure up to $400 million, a substantial portion of the overall $1.5 billion is expected to be raised through a pre-IPO round. Sunil Gupta, Yotta’s co-founder and chief executive officer, elaborated on this strategy, stating, “Our 1.5 billion fund-raise is a combination of pre-IPO fundraising, as well as an IPO. We are targeting Q4 of this fiscal year, subject to Sebi approval—we’re working towards ensuring compliance.” He further explained that discussions are underway with large funds in the United States and those with a presence in India, indicating a broad outreach for the pre-IPO capital. The ultimate scale of the IPO will, therefore, directly correlate with the amount secured in this preceding funding stage.
Initially, Yotta had considered a listing in the United States, but the company has since re-evaluated its strategy, now focusing on a domestic listing in India. Gupta highlighted that the company’s “sovereign-cloud” business model makes an Indian listing a more suitable fit. He emphasized that Yotta’s entire infrastructure is built within India, and the Indian government is a major client for its sovereign cloud services, a model he believes the Indian private sector will increasingly adopt due to heightened awareness of geopolitical risks. Gupta also revealed that there was a clear encouragement from the government to pursue fundraising within India.
Yotta Data Services was established in 2019 by Sunil Gupta and Darshan Hiranandani, who also serves as the chief executive officer of the Hiranandani Group, a prominent real estate firm. Financial disclosures made to the Ministry of Corporate Affairs reveal that for the year ending March 2025, the privately held company reported revenues of Rs. 890.7 crore and a profit of Rs. 11.1 crore.
The $1.5 billion fundraising initiative represents a crucial step in Yotta’s broader capital expansion strategy. The company has outlined plans to raise an ambitious $8.5 billion by 2029, coinciding with its objective to significantly increase its installed data center capacity from 180MW to 800MW, more than quadrupling its current footprint.
A substantial portion of this capital will be dedicated to acquiring Nvidia chips and developing the necessary infrastructure to provide computing power for artificial intelligence (AI) applications. Yotta anticipates a substantial increase in the number of Nvidia chips deployed across its data centers, rising from 37,000 to 85,000 by the end of the current fiscal year.
The burgeoning data center market in India is being propelled by a confluence of regulatory mandates and a surging demand for computing capabilities. The Reserve Bank of India, for instance, requires payment data to be stored within the country, and Sebi imposes similar regulations on market participants. Furthermore, the nationwide rollout of 5G technology, the proliferation of connected devices, and the rapid adoption of generative AI are collectively intensifying the demand for high-speed computing infrastructure.
Yotta’s expansion aligns with a major investment cycle currently underway in India’s data center market. As of March 13, the country’s data center capacity stood at 1.5GW, according to a press note from the central government. Other operators are also actively raising substantial funds to fuel their expansion plans. In March, Airtel-backed Nxtra successfully raised $1 billion from private-equity investors Alphawave, Carlyle, and Anchorage Capital, earmarking these funds for the development of 1GW of data center capacity. Similarly, in June, Hyderabad-based CtrlS Datacenters secured $425 million from a Canadian public pension fund, with the aim of expanding its capacity from 370MW to 2GW over the next five years. Additionally, major Indian conglomerates such as Adani and Reliance Industries Ltd have publicly announced plans to invest over $100 billion each in data centers over the coming decade.
Against this backdrop of robust investment, Yotta’s proposed $1.5 billion raise stands out as a significant sum, even within India’s rapidly expanding data center market. However, the company is pursuing a distinct operational model compared to conventional data center operators. Its capital requirements extend beyond traditional data center infrastructure to include GPUs, high-density power and cooling solutions, advanced networking, and storage capabilities. Ashish Banerjee, a senior principal analyst at Gartner, commented on this, stating, “At $1.5 billion, Yotta’s proposed capital raise would be significant even by the standards of India’s rapidly expanding data-centre market.” He further clarified, “But, it is not an apples-to-apples comparison with every other data centre fundraise. Yotta is seeking to build a GPU-intensive AI infrastructure platform, in which the investment extends beyond traditional data-centre capacity to include GPUs, high-density power and cooling, networking, and storage. The size of the proposed raise reflects the substantial step-up from its current operational footprint to its announced capacity ambitions.”
