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MENAFN- Mid-East Info)
Developed by MBZUAI in collaboration with Inception, a G42 company, and Cerebras, the 87-billion-parameter model brings new scale and fluency to Hindi-English LLMs
Open-source model supports inclusive AI adoption, advancing G42's mission to democratize access by making advanced tools accessible to India's digital ecosystem
Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates: G42, the Abu Dhabi-based global technology group, today announced a major upgrade to Llama-3-Nanda, or NANDA for short, its open-source Hindi-English large language model (LLM). Developed by Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI) in collaboration with Inception, a G42 company, and Cerebras, makers of the world's fastest AI inference, NANDA now features 87 billion parameters, setting a new benchmark in language AI tailored for Hindi speakers.
Built upon Llama-3.1 70B, NANDA 87B has been trained on a curated Hindi-English dataset with over 65 billion Hindi tokens. A custom Hindi-centric tokenizer boosts efficiency, reducing both training and inference time. This breakthrough makes it the largest and one of the most capable Hindi-centric models available in open weights.
The model is engineered for real-world use: fluent in formal Hindi (Devanagari script), casual speech, and Hinglish, it delivers strong performance across translation, summarization, instruction-following, and transliteration tasks. Safety and cultural alignment are core to its design, enabling NANDA to generate context-aware, responsible responses.
“India deserves world-class technology that speaks its language. NANDA 87B is a major step in that direction, after our first NANDA model announced last year,” said Manu Jain, CEO of G42 India.“As we continue to scale our operations across the country, this model opens doors for more inclusive innovation in education, entertainment, enterprise, and beyond. This upgrade reflects G42's deep commitment to building AI solutions that serve India's vibrant AI ecosystem.”
“At MBZUAI, our mission is to advance AI in ways that deliver broad, positive impact for society. NANDA marks an important milestone in bringing high-quality, open-access language technology to one of the world's largest and most dynamic linguistic communities,” said Richard Morton, Executive Director, Institute of Foundation Models, MBZUAI.“Through our collaboration with G42 and Cerebras, we are underscoring the value of culturally aligned and inclusive AI research - work that supports underserved languages and expands access to advanced AI capabilities for hundreds of millions of Hindi speakers worldwide.”
With over 600 million Hindi speakers and one of the world's fastest-growing digital economies, India represents a crucial market for regional AI innovation. With over 80% of new internet users preferring local languages, models like NANDA can play a pivotal role in bridging digital divides.
“The upgrade of NANDA is a leap forward in making AI tools accessible for India's vast number of users,” said Ashish Koshy, CEO of Inception.“By combining cutting-edge research with open access, NANDA is designed to serve content creators, educators, developers, and enterprises working across India's digital landscape. This milestone reflects our continued commitment to building AI-native solutions for the Global South and accelerating AI adoption across high-impact sectors.”
The model was trained on Condor Galaxy, one of the world's most powerful AI supercomputers for training and inferencing built by G42 and Cerebras.
NANDA 87B is now available as an open-weight model on MBZUAI Hugging Face page, enabling creators, developers, and enterprises to explore and build upon its capabilities.
About G42:
G42 is a technology holding group and a global leader in creating visionary artificial intelligence for a better tomorrow. Born in Abu Dhabi and operating worldwide, G42 champions AI as a powerful force for good across industries. From molecular biology to space exploration and everything in between, G42 realizes exponential possibilities today.
About Inception:
Inception, a G42 company, is the region's leading innovator of AI-powered domain-specific as well as industry-agnostic products, built on a rich heritage of research and development. Within the G42 ecosystem, Inception functions as the core intelligence layer – transforming data and compute infrastructure into real-world, applied AI solutions. Beyond its commercial endeavors, Inception is committed to creating positive societal impact. Believing that language should never be a barrier to innovation, it has developed three bi-lingual LLMs: JAIS (Arabic), NANDA (Hindi), and SHERKALA (Kazakh). Through QudraTech, an AI-capacity building program for talent upskilling and remote work for Emiratis, Inception actively supports the UAE's ambition to become the world's most AI-prepared nation.
About Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI)
MBZUAI is a research-focused university in Abu Dhabi, and the first university dedicated entirely to the advancement of science through AI. The university empowers the next generation of AI leaders, driving innovation and impactful applications of AI through world-class education and interdisciplinary research. In 2025, MBZUAI launched its first ever undergraduate program, a Bachelor of Science in AI, with two distinct streams: Business and Engineering.
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