The India AI Impact Summit 2026 is a five-day international conference taking place from February 16 to 20, 2026, at Bharat Mandapam, New Delhi. Positioned as the first major global AI summit hosted in the Global South, the event is anchored in the theme “Sarvajan Hitaya, Sarvajan Sukhaya meaning “Welfare for All, Happiness for All. The India AI Impact Summit 2026 has come into the spotlight as the first AI global summit is going on in the Global South, and hence cites India as a responsible, inclusive AI innovation leader. It showcases 51 startups in the sectors of media, gaming, and creative technologies to promote the purpose of providing employment, safeguarding the cultural heritage, and enhancing global partnerships with regard to the creative economy.
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Key Highlights
- A.I. and the Creative Economy
- AI’s Strategic Role in the Orange Economy
- AI as a Growth Multiplier
- MIB Pavilion: Showcasing India’s AI Startup Ecosystem
- Indian AI and Gaming Startups
- International Resources and Mobile Opportunities in AI
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The India AI Impact Summit 2026 is being held from 16 to 20 February 2026 at Bharat Mandapam, New Delhi. A key highlight of the summit is its focus on the Creative Economy, prominently featured through the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB) Pavilion and the dedicated WAVES Creators Corner. The India AI Impact Summit of 2026, held at Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi, is a historic event in world-methodology technology conversation, as it will be the first international AI summit in the Global South. While guided by the agenda of People, Progress, and Planet, the summit reflects India, thereby growing leadership in the field of artificial intelligence and its adoption in the creative economy.
The Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB) Pavilion became one of the critical locations where 51 Startups were to be shown through AVGC-XR and Media Tech. Including filmmaking, gaming, immersive storytelling, and multilingual accessibility, the summit reflects how AI is reshaping production pipelines, driving a new employment cycle, and bringing other advantages of this technology to the preservation of cultures. The event brings together policymakers, creators, investors, and international stakeholders, which makes India a global hub of responsible, inclusive, and scalable AI-based growth.
A.I. and the Creative Economy: From Vision to Impact
India focusing on the intersection of AI and the creative economy. India has undergone a paradigmatic change in a creative economy where artificial intelligence (AI) becomes the central stimulating factor behind innovation, the creation of jobs, and increased global competitiveness.
AI’s Strategic Role in the Orange Economy
The Orange Economy, an economic representation of creativity and culture, is the combination of heritage, talent, and technology that will create income and global impact. The various creative industries in India, including media, entertainment, gaming, and digital content, have been identified as drivers of growth and are increasingly being recognised as a strategic effort. The PIB stated that the sector remains a primary contributor to GDP, employment, and export and, therefore, makes creativity one of the building blocks of sustainable development.
Union Budget 2026-27 Initiatives for AI
This trend is supported by the Union Budget 2026-27, which officially identifies the sphere of Animation, Visual Effects, Gaming, and Comics (AVGC) as the core of the AI-driven development. One such initiative has been the launch of AVGC Content Creator Labs in high schools and colleges (15,000 and 500, respectively), financed with the help of the Indian Institute of Creative Technologies (IICT), Mumbai. The proposed skilling pipeline will address the estimated requirement of close to 2 million professionals by 2030, and this will make sure that the youth of India are skilled to cope with the digital era.
AI as a Growth Multiplier
The incorporation of AI in the realms of the creative industry boosts productivity, scalability, and multiple languages. Automated editing and dubbing, adaptive gameplay and storytelling make AI reinforce production pipelines and increase the global market penetration. This technological and creative intersection highlights the idea of India intending to develop AI-native systems, which are not only cheaper to develop economically but are also culturally representative.
MIB Pavilion: Showcasing India’s AI Startup Ecosystem
MIB Pavilion Emerges as India's Premier AI Innovation Workspace at India AI Impact Summit 2026. The presentation at the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB) Pavilion at the India AI Impact Summit 2026 gives an overview of the transforming strengths of the emerging AI startup ecosystem, the networking point between technology, creative mind, and business.
AI in the Media and Entertainment Innovations
The Pavilion shows AI-based filming solutions, the multilingual dubbing of the film, avatars, and automated editing. In 2024, the media and entertainment industry of India was valued at INR 2.5 trillion, and this is expected to jump to INR 3.067 trillion by the year 2027 at a growth rate of 7 percent yearly. The digital media itself produced almost one-third of the revenues, which highlights a fast digitalization of the sector.
AI in Immersive Technologies and Gaming
Gaming is presented as one of the most rapidly expanding sectors of the creative economy. The income earned in online gaming recorded in 2024 stood at INR 232 billion, and the revenues are projected to go up to INR 316 billion by 2027. Such AI-native technologies as adaptive gameplay generators, immersive sports technologies, and asset-generative AI are examples of how India focuses on the shift in the consumer-oriented gaming industry to the production of original, AI-driven development.
AI in Innovative and Content Technologies
The Pavilion also focuses on AI use in podcasts, immersive theatre, and experiential media. By 2024, animation and VFX contributed INR 103 billion, which is expected to increase to INR 147 billion by 2027. The sector has hubs in Bengaluru, Hyderabad, and Mumbai, and with the help of these hubs, the sector forms part of the global production lines, and employment opportunities in the sector are expected to reach close to two million jobs by 2030.
Indian AI and Gaming Startups: on the frontline of innovation
Indian AI and gaming startups are leading global innovation by blending generative AI with immersive technology, with key players like Yesgnome, Metasports (Hitwicket), Koyozo, Youth Buzz (Ourcadium), and Evivve showcasing advanced AI-powered solutions at the 2026 India AI Impact Summit. The AI-based gaming startups are becoming the new leaders in the global creative economy, with Indian startups proving to be innovative, combining technology, storytelling, and the transformation of an enterprise.
Game Production Generative AI
Yesgnome has presented Sketly AI, which is an advanced-generation artwork platform that permits the studio to generate production-ready assets, training on proprietary styles, and scaling to workflows. This new technology helps ease the bottlenecks and maintain artistic coherence, which gives AI added power in the pipelines of creative energy.
Real‑Time Sports Commentary by AI
As an example of generative AI commentaries, Metasports (Hitwicket), runs on multiplayer cricket apps. It helps localise the gameplay on the screen and provides the player with contextual narration, which increases immersion and personalisation, which marks AI involvement in interactive sports entertainment.
Console‑Grade AI Mobile Gaming
Koyozo demonstrates a hardware-software platform that makes smartphones console-like and will solve the fragmentation in the Indian mobile gaming market. As the company is set to achieve higher revenues from INR 232 billion in 2024 to INR 316 billion by 2027, with the help of such innovations, the competitive gameplay is reinforced.
Enterprise Readiness and Human vs. AI Gameplay
Youth Buzz (Ourcadium) is live adaptive formatting in which humans can compete against growing AI agents, and its contents reflect the trend in India towards original IP. In the meantime, Evivve is launching the Enterprise Cognitive AI Readiness Tool that uses neuroscience-based models to determine the readiness of an organisation to adopt AI.
International Resources and Mobile Opportunities in AI
The global artificial intelligence landscape is increasingly shaped by broader access to resources and the rapid rise of mobile-first AI applications, especially across emerging economies. By 2026, efforts to make GPUs, datasets, and AI models more affordable are narrowing the digital divide, with countries such as India, Egypt, and Kenya working together to build a more inclusive and collaborative AI ecosystem. The India AI Impact Summit 2026 has launched new opportunities in the world to startups and creative professionals, with India serving as a focal point of responsible and scalable artificial-intelligence innovation.
Global Exposure and AI Market Access
It convened more than 600 startups and the delegations of 13 countries representing over 100 nations. This high involvement provides the Indian companies with benchmarking opportunities in the animation and games and creative artificial intelligence sphere, as well as enabling co-production deals and investment connections in the various foreign markets. Such exposure makes India integrated in production systems and regulation systems around the world.
The Investment and Policy Dialogue in AI
The international investors and the industry leaders were gathered in a special panel called The New Gold Rush: Investing in AI-Powered gaming of the future in India. The talks focused on changing investment patterns, production modes that can be automated using AI, and skilling programs. The discussions demonstrate how the policy frameworks can enable India to become a global powerhouse in the AI-powered creative sectors.
Language and Cultural Inclusivity with AI
Other examples of AI tools in the Pavilion included Bhashasetu and Kalaasetu, which specialize in preserving cultural heritage and guarantee linguistic access. By being multilingually dubbed and providing AI sign-language avatars, these solutions enhance inclusivity and ensure that the linguistic groups with a variety of languages in India enjoy the benefits of AI-powered creative technologies. It is in this spirit that a holistic model is emphasized in which technology is being used to both develop the economy and preserve culture.
Conclusion
The India AI Impact Summit 2026 reflects the strategic approach of implementing artificial intelligence in the Indian creative economy that encompasses media, gaming, and immersive technologies. In a multi-faceted startup exhibition, MIB Pavilion puts in the limelight the intersection of innovation, cultural inclusiveness, and international collaboration. India demonstrates the creation of work and multilingual access programs and the synthesis of foreign collaboration, thus establishing itself as the key player in the responsible and scalable artificial intelligence creation and establishing its role as the global leader as a country of the Global South.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s)
Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the India AI Impact Expo on 16 February 2026 at Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi. Emphasizing India’s dedication to ethical and inclusive artificial intelligence.
The India–AI Impact Summit 2026 will also emphasize deeper global collaboration, the advancement of responsible and ethical AI practices, and the accelerated integration of AI across key sectors of the economy.
Jitin Prasada, Union Minister of State for Commerce & Industry and Electronics & Information Technology, addressed the event titled From Action to Impact a curtain-raiser to the AI Impact Summit (19–20 February 2026, New Delhi). Where India has been leading AI discussions and events under its role in the Global Partnership on Artificial Intelligence and related government-backed initiatives.
As of 2025, the United States ranks No. 1 in artificial intelligence, retaining its position as the global leader in AI research, infrastructure, innovation, and investment.
India ranks as the third most competitive country in artificial intelligence globally, behind the United States and China, according to Stanford University’s 2025 Global AI Vibrancy Tool. The ranking reflects India’s expanding tech ecosystem, strong talent base, and rising investment momentum.