Tech Mahindra Makers Lab
The Corporate Innovator Going Native
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The prevailing assumption in India’s AI ecosystem is that meaningful innovation can come only from venture-backed startups. Tech Mahindra’s Makers Lab exists to challenge that notion.
Led by Chief Innovation Officer Nikhil Malhotra, Makers Lab is developing Project Indus, an 8-billion-parameter model for Indic languages with a particular focus on Hindi dialects, alongside Orion, an agentic AI platform built for government applications. The IndiaAI Mission has backed both projects.
Makers Lab offers a key advantage that pure startups struggle to match: distribution. As part of a $6 billion IT services company, it has established relationships with enterprise clients and government agencies, along with the credibility to deploy AI in regulated settings—areas where most startups have yet to gain entry. The innovation is genuine, but it’s the access that makes this opportunity truly significant.
