Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), on 16 January, announced its plan to train its staff of over 5 lakh software engineers on the upcoming Generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) opportunity.

According to Siva Ganesan, head of the company’s recently established ‘AI.Cloud’ unit, Gen AI as a business opportunity is still in its “early days” with fewer use cases. This was reported to PTI. He said that the business, which had previously revealed that it was working on 250 projects utilising generative AI, is also utilising the knowledge gained from Gen AI to expedite its ongoing work for clients.

Ganesan said, “So it’s probably a smaller use case right now. It is a matter of time before the huge transformation that we also talk about that supplements assets and augment come by. Is there a timeline for that? I think for right now, it is wait and watch; we have to see in the coming quarters right as the game unfolds.”

TCS is in investment mode as it prepares for the future, which will see a higher demand for AI offerings. Officials stated that the company’s main goals are to equip its workforce with the necessary skills and to partner with the appropriate organisations.

He added, “The workforce is getting geared and getting primed and it’s a matter of time when all the organisation itself is (Gen) AI ready.”

In response to a question about the estimated time frame for completing staff training on Gen AI skill sets, Ganesan said that it would be easy to calculate given the current training rate, which has trained over 1.50 lakh staff members in the skillsets in roughly seven months.

Harrick Vin, chief technology officer of TCS, said, “We are very confident to create one of the world’s largest AI-ready workforce for the future, so I think we can safely say that with a high degree of confidence.”