India on Friday joined the Pax Silica – a United States-led international strategic alliance launched last year to secure global Artificial Intelligence and semiconductor supply chains and reduce dependence on non-aligned nations.
This will strengthen bilateral ties in areas like the production of critical minerals and in the rapidly evolving Artificial Intelligence space, to create a safe and strong global tech ecosystem.
The agreement was signed on the last day of the India AI Impact Summit, a five-day gathering of AI business leaders, innovators, and policymakers that featured over 600 AI-related start-ups.
"The world trusts India... we have a large talent pool and conduct our foreign policy in a way that creates this trust. As part of that, today Pax Silica was signed, which is important for the semiconductor supply chain and manufacturing, and chip design," Union IT Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said.
Vaishnaw said joining this accord would greatly benefit India's electronics and semiconductor industry.
"Ten plants are established and soon the first semiconductor plant will begin commercial production. In that context, the most advanced two-nanometer chips are being designed in India today. A complete ecosystem is emerging in India (and) pax Silica will be crucial for this..." he said.
Also at the signing ceremony, US Ambassador Sergio Gor said, "We welcome India… Pax Silica is about a free society… it is about whether innovation happens in Bengaluru or in surveillance states, where they use technology to monitor and control their people. We choose freedom… partnership… strength. And today, with India's entry into Pax Silica, we choose to win."
Google boss Sundar Pichai, one of several high-profile attendees at the AI conference in Delhi, underlined the critical nature of the India-US partnership in making AI benefits available to everyone. He said Google is proud to be the link between the nations, "figuratively and literally".
"We have teams across both countries working seamlessly together on some of our most important initiatives and innovations that start in India, like Google Pay… I believe India is going to have an extraordinary AI trajectory and we are supporting it with a full stack commitment."
The signing of the Pax Silica agreement followed India and the United States closing an interim trade deal, focused on reduction of tariffs and loosening import/export controls, this month.
Referring to the signing of that deal, Gor said Delhi and Washington had significant opportunities to work together and that he hopes to help advance this partnership.
"Earlier this month, we concluded the interim trade agreement… a deal that shapes the economic contours of the Indo-Pacific. We overcame friction points that held us back for far too long. That agreement wasn't just about trade flows or tariff schedules. It was about two great democracies saying, we will build together, not just buy from one another…" he said.
What is Pax Silica?
Pax Silica aims to create a shared plan among trusted countries so they can build AI and tech systems for the future. The initiative covers all steps in the technology supply chain, including everything from energy and critical minerals to high-tech manufacturing and AI models.
Apart from the US, Pax Silica member nations include Australia, Greece, Israel, Japan, Qatar, South Korea, Singapore, the United Arab Emirates, and the United Kingdom.
The long-term goal is to bring these countries closer together so they can unlock the full economic potential of Artificial Intelligence and benefit from the new AI-driven economy.
'AI as transformative force'
The Pax Silica Declaration notes: "We recognise that the technological revolution in AI is accelerating, increasingly reorganising the world economy, and reshaping global supply chains."
The AI revolution is creating historic demand for energy to power AI systems and computers, critical minerals, high-tech manufacturing and hardware, including chips and electronics, infrastructure and new markets that support AI in ways not yet invented.
One of Pax Silica's core objectives is to reduce coercive dependencies.
This means countries should not rely too much on one country for materials, technology or products, and can avoid being pressured or manipulated in global trade.
Another is to focus on building a trusted digital infrastructure and also to ensure that advanced technologies are safe from theft or misuse.
