Big-budget campaigns show how AI companies are racing for relevance in India

Bala, with his curly hair and chequered tan shirt, walks with the quiet confidence of a man who knows something the rest don't. Children and the elderly gape at him. His stride, slow and purposeful, leads him to the overflowing water purifier in the kitchen. He looks at the purifier, leans in, and grabs something. Then, as if by magic, the leakage stops. The audience looks at him in awe, smiles appearing on their lips. Bala smirks, wiping his wet hands in a towel. In the background, a ChatGPT tab opens on screen with the prompt: Water overflowing. What could it be? This is the latest advertisement for the generative-AI pioneer, released just over a week ago, with the tagline "Fix it like a pro with ChatGPT". ChatGPT's rival - Google's Gemini - is flexing its muscle too. It is peppering the Indian Premier League (IPL) broadcast on the video streaming platform JioHotstar with 30 to 50-second ads promoting the new AI mode of Google Search. These ads feature banter between actors Ishaan Khatter and Sara Arjun, with plenty of AI search use cases thrown in. Google has gained massive visibility during the game, thanks to a ₹270-crore deal with the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) that allows the integration of Gemini in live broadcast and commentary. For both ChatGPT and Gemini, India is one of the biggest markets. Globally, Gemini app has 750 million monthly active users, according its latest blog. What may seem like a relatively simple marketing push is part of a much larger play. The big battle in artificial intelligence is no longer limited to building better models. As AI companies race to find users and relevance in India, OpenAI and Google are turning to mainstream media to present AI as an everyday problem-solver. The big push is to showcase AI as a default habit. And in that race, visibility matters. Mode: Category Building Why do products that initially went viral and grew organically now need mass-market advertising? Vikram Sakhuja, director at media agency Madison World, says the big players in AI are all in the category building mode. "There are four big players in the LLM (large language model) market - ChatGPT, Gemini, Anthropic Claude, and Perplexity. It's a little crowded and all of them have deep pockets. At this point, they are trying to build the category." For AI companies, the eventual play is to be what Google became for search - a synonym. In that journey, Sakhuja says, ChatGPT has a big advantage, with others playing catch up. That explains the big IPL push from Gemini. Boosting daily usage is key. The novelty of AI was the driver of downloads early in the game. The idea now is to highlight the impact AI can have in everyday life through advertising. By making ads India-centric and relatable, AI companies are trying to bring a shift in perception and user behaviour. The goal is to highlight the relevance of AI and make it ubiquitous. Jaspreet Bindra, founder of AI literacy initiative AI&Beyond, says that for AI companies, "the space to become the default is still open. AI is being positioned as the new search". If this takes off, it might give tech companies enough scale to launch ad-supported AI models eventually. Srinivas RG, founder of AiAIyo, a boutique AI consultancy firm, agrees. Take the ChatGPT ad, for example. A leak in a water purifier is a common problem. The ad shows the first line of defence does not have to be a customer care number or the plumber. It suggests a ChatGPT search, and some DIY, can fix it for you. Gemini ads have a similar tone. In a series titled, "Google Gemini: Your Everyday Assistant", ads ranged from getting Gemini to help with filing reimbursement claims and fixing tools to learning to smash in badminton. "If you look at the ads, you can see people using Gemini to fix guitars or help them study better. They illustrate how normal people can use the tool for everyday issues," Srinivas says. Bait and Switch There is an element of bait and switch at play. Unlike traditional search, running queries through large language models is several times more expensive. That means that big tech firms don't have a similar timescale as they did when they built the advertiser-funded model of the internet. They need to make money sooner and from more sources. Popular AI companies such as Google's Gemini, OpenAI, and Perplexity have offered free access to their advanced tiers of Indian customers for about a year, to acquire new users. Gemini did this through Reliance Jio and Perplexity through Airtel. The goal is to move beyond early adoption, and, having embedded these tools into daily routines, convert the rapidly growing base of free users into paying customers. "By advertising on mass market platforms, they are trying to convert those users into paying subscribers. They are trying to tell you that we have offered you free access, and you have seen the value. Now it's time to pay up," Karthik Srinivasan, communications strategy consultant, says. Bindra says the most intriguing reason for large-scale adoption of AI in India could be traced to the viral comment by Bloomberg's Catherine Thorbecke: "India is the AI world's most valuable unpaid intern." His theory is that AI companies want millions of AI users in India, "even if free, but doing different things, so that they can train the models on both core and edge use cases. So, this helps make India the world's largest prompt farm." Old and New What is unique is, contrary to the thinking that traditional media is losing relevance, AI behemoths are relying on television and billboards to reach the heart of India. As Srinivasan says, the media mix is "truly mainstream media". According to him, this is because you cannot convert users into customers with just ads on digital platforms. Average customers see ads on all media - digital, TV, newspaper, and outdoors. To influence behaviour, a broad media mix may be needed, considering the amount of storytelling required to create narratives that move the behavioural needle. AI's push on traditional media is not, by any stretch, the firsttime big tech is going the traditional way. WhatsApp has advertised on television for many years, to build trust in the brand. YouTube embraced print and built a profile as an advertising platform of heft. Apart from Gemini's partnership with the BCCI, OpenAI has a multi-year partnership with Indian Women's Premier League for 2026 and 2027. Canva, an AIpowered design platform, was in the running to sponsor jerseys for the Indian cricket team, before Apollo Tyres won the bid. The timing of the AI boom helped, too, in its adoption. Srinivasan says, when Dream11 pulled out from jersey sponsorship deals after the real money gaming industry shut down in India, it created a space that AI companies were quick to take up. Will AI truly start being a utility for the most populous country in the world? While that may happen, AI companies are throwing the kitchen sink at it with one hope - to be the model people reach for first.