US legal issues behind it, Adani bets on AI-driven infrastructure boom

Billionaire Gautam Adani said the Adani Group has moved beyond its US legal challenges and is accelerating investments across energy, transport, logistics and digital infrastructure, positioning itself to benefit from rising demand for artificial intelligence-led growth.

In his annual letter to shareholders, Adani said the conglomerate remained committed to expansion despite heightened scrutiny over the past year, adding that matters related to the group’s US legal proceedings were now “behind us”, allowing it to focus on its next phase of growth.

Adani described the group’s recent Rs 24,930 crore rights issue in flagship firm Adani Enterprises as a vote of confidence from investors at a time when the conglomerate faced questions over governance and regulatory issues.

“Even though it was a year in which the world grew more fractured, complex energy security models returned to the centre of national strategy and technology became inseparable from sovereignty, Adani Group remained anchored to an unwavering belief - India’s future cannot wait,” he said.

“While others debated, the Group built, advancing its journey as the world’s most integrated infrastructure platform — across energy, transport, logistics, utilities and industrial manufacturing.” And this progress did not come in calm conditions for the ports-to-energy conglomerate.

“It came in the middle of extraordinary scrutiny.  However, we did not bend. We did not pause,” he said. “Because what we have always been defined by is: Not the noise that surrounds us, but the strength of our response.

Not the intensity of the challenge, but the clarity of our purpose. Not the criticism, but the nation-building we continue to believe in.” Adani also sought to draw a line under the legal and regulatory challenges that have weighed on the group since late 2024.

“The matters related to our US legal proceedings are now behind us thereby allowing us to focus with renewed confidence and belief on the next phase of our growth,” he said.

The Adani Group has faced scrutiny from US authorities over bribery allegations linked to its renewable energy business, charges the conglomerate has denied. While the US Securities Exchange Commission has reached a settlement with the Adnai Group on the issue, the US Department of Justice has moved to drop all charges against the founder and others.

The chairman outlined a strategy centred on what he called two converging growth drivers - infrastructure and intelligence - arguing that the rapid adoption of artificial intelligence will require massive investments in power generation, transmission networks, data centres and logistics infrastructure.

“Before AI can think, energy must flow,” Adani said, reiterating his view that future technological leadership will depend as much on physical infrastructure as on software and digital innovation.

The group said it invested more than Rs 1.5 lakh crore during fiscal 2025-26, one of its largest annual capital expenditure programmes, as it expanded renewable energy, transmission, ports, airports, data centres and manufacturing operations.

Among key milestones, Adani Green added 5.1 gigawatts of renewable energy capacity during the year, taking its operational portfolio to more than 19 GW, while Adani New Industries commissioned a 5-MW green hydrogen pilot project.

Adani Energy Solutions increased its transmission order book to Rs 71,779 crore, while Adani Power continued work on a more than Rs 2 lakh crore expansion programme aimed at raising generation capacity to 42 GW by fiscal 2032.

The group also highlighted progress in digital infrastructure, including plans to build a 2-GW data centre platform by 2030 and a memorandum of understanding with Google for a large-scale data centre project in Visakhapatnam.

Adani Ports handled more than 500 million tonnes of cargo during the year, while the group’s airport business commissioned the Navi Mumbai International Airport and a new terminal at Guwahati Airport.

For fiscal 2025-26, the group’s portfolio companies reported consolidated revenue of Rs 2.92 lakh crore, up 7.4 per cent from a year earlier, while profit after tax rose 13.9 per cent to Rs 46,377 crore.

Looking ahead, Adani said the group’s biggest challenge was no longer access to capital but executing projects fast enough to meet India’s infrastructure and energy needs, particularly as artificial intelligence drives demand for power-intensive digital infrastructure.