Virudhunagar, a peaceful town in southeastern India, is better known for centuries-old temples than cutting-edge technology. Yet today, locals are training artificial intelligence systems that shape the digital world.
Ancient surroundings, modern ambition
Mohan Kumar spends his workdays teaching machines to understand and predict the world. “I work in AI annotation. I collect and label data to train models so they can recognize objects and make decisions independently over time,” he explains.
India has long been a hub for outsourced IT services, with cities like Bangalore and Chennai leading the way. Recently, however, companies have moved work to smaller towns, where skilled labor is abundant and operational costs are lower.
This trend, called cloud farming, has transformed towns like Virudhunagar into emerging AI hubs.
Bringing high-tech jobs to rural India
Mohan Kumar sees no disadvantage in staying local. “Professionally, there’s no difference. We work with the same global clients and use the same training and tools,” he says.
He works for Desicrew, founded in 2005, one of India’s early cloud farming pioneers. “We realised people shouldn’t have to move to cities for jobs,” says chief executive Mannivannan J. K. “Opportunities were concentrated in metros. We wanted to show world-class work can come from anywhere.”
Desicrew handles software testing, content moderation, and AI dataset preparation. “Currently, 30 to 40% of our work is AI-related,” Mannivannan says. “That will soon rise to 75 to 100%.”
Teaching machines to understand humans
Much of Desicrew’s AI work involves transcription—turning audio into text. “Machines understand text far better,” Mannivannan explains. “To make AI sound natural, it must learn how people speak in different accents and dialects. Transcription provides that foundation.”
He stresses that rural offices can match urban tech centres. “People assume rural means outdated, but our centres are fully equipped with secure systems, fast internet, and stable electricity. Geography is the only difference.”
About 70% of Desicrew’s workforce are women. “For many, this is their first salaried job,” Mannivannan says. “It transforms families, providing financial security and better opportunities for children.”
Unlocking small-town talent
NextWealth, founded in 2008, shares a similar vision. Headquartered in Bangalore, it employs 5,000 people across 11 smaller towns.
“Sixty percent of India’s graduates come from small towns, yet most IT jobs are in metros,” says co-founder Mythily Ramesh. “That leaves a huge untapped pool of bright, first-generation graduates. Their parents are farmers, tailors, or small business owners who make big sacrifices for education.”
NextWealth started with back-office work but shifted to AI five years ago. “Some of the world’s most advanced algorithms are trained and validated in India’s smaller towns,” Ramesh says.
Global clients, local expertise
About 70% of NextWealth’s business comes from the US. “Every AI system—from chatbots to facial recognition—depends on large amounts of human-labelled data,” Ramesh explains. “That data is the foundation of cloud farming jobs.”
She predicts rapid growth. “In the next three to five years, AI and generative AI will create nearly 100 million jobs in training and validation. Small-town India can lead that expansion.”
Ramesh believes India has a valuable head start. “Countries like the Philippines may catch up, but India’s scale and early start give it a five to seven-year advantage. We must use it while the gap exists.”
Challenges remain
Technology advisor KS Viswanathan, formerly with India’s National Association of Software and Service Companies, says cloud farming is transforming global AI. “Silicon Valley builds the AI engines, but India’s small towns keep them running,” he says.
He believes rural India could become the global hub for AI operations. “If growth continues, small-town India may replicate its success in IT from two decades ago.”
Yet challenges persist. “Internet speed and secure data centres are not always at metro levels,” Viswanathan warns. “Data security remains a constant concern.”
Perception is another obstacle. “Some international clients still assume small towns cannot meet strict standards. Trust must be earned through consistent results,” he adds.
The human touch behind AI
At NextWealth, Dhanalakshmi Vijay fine-tunes AI daily. When a model mistakes a denim jacket for a navy shirt, she corrects it. “Each fix improves the system,” she says. “It’s like giving the AI experience — it learns from each correction.”
Her work affects millions of users. “We train AI that makes online shopping faster and more accurate,” she says. “We help machines understand human behaviour better.”
A digital future rooted in rural India
From Virudhunagar to dozens of small towns, young professionals and first-generation graduates are quietly shaping global AI. Their work proves that innovation does not belong only in skyscrapers and cities. It thrives in rural India, where ancient traditions and cutting-edge technology now grow side by side.
