India’s data explosion demands new strategies where cloud, AI, and compliance converge. Ramanujam Komanduri, Country Manager at Pure Storage says enterprises must view data as their most valuable assetand manage it with intelligence and sovereignty.
India’s digital economy is exploding fueled by rapid adoption of cloud, AI, and data-first strategies but it’s also facing the twin challenges of sovereignty and sustainability. In an exclusive conversation with CIO & Leader, Ramanujam Komanduri, Country Manager of Pure Storage India, reveals why the next phase of digital transformation won’t just be about storing data, but about making it sovereign, intelligent, and efficient. From powering AI workloads to cutting data center power use by 80%, he argues that the winners of tomorrow will be those who treat data as their “crown jewels” and build strategies around it.
“Post-COVID, everything went digital, and India became the largest digital economy,” observed Komanduri. He pointed to four tectonic shifts reshaping the data landscape: lightning-fast digital transactions, longer compliance-driven data retention, the rising menace of ransomware, and the disruptive entry of AI into enterprise systems.
His anecdote about updating his Aadhaar completed “instantaneously” underscores the dramatic acceleration. This is not an isolated story; India now counts 759 million active internet users, and digital transactions crossed $3 trillion in FY23. The world’s most populous country has also become its most ambitious digital laboratory.
Cloud as the New Enterprise Backbone
For Komanduri, the debate is already settled: “Cloud is inevitable whether through hyperscalers or private data centers.” Yet, it’s not just about adopting the cloud but about protecting what matters most. “Data is now intellectual property,” he emphasized, calling it the “crown jewels” of an enterprise.
The emerging trend is an enterprise-wide data cloud, a unified architecture that integrates fragmented silos of on-prem, file, object, and block storage. In this model, accessibility and governance converge, ensuring data serves business needs without being lost in complexity.
Compliance, Sovereignty, and Infrastructure
The passage of India’s Digital Personal Data Protection (DPDP) Act has raised the stakes for enterprises. “That requirement is sacrosanct,” Komanduri said firmly. Data sovereignty is now non-negotiable; organizations must keep Indian data within India’s borders.
This regulation coincides with a data explosion: 1.3 billion citizens generating new records daily. To meet demand, India’s data center capacity is projected to triple in the next few years. But with expansion comes a new challenge surging energy use. Pure Storage, Komanduri noted, addresses this with proprietary flash technology that cuts power and space usage by up to 80%, offering both sustainability and scalability.
AI as the Silent Workhorse
AI, Komanduri said, has quietly become indispensable to modern infrastructure. “Without AI, managing, monitoring, and scaling today’s platforms would be nearly impossible.” Pure Storage’s systems embed AI to automate data movement, optimize workloads, and guide administrators on performance.
This shifts AI from being a buzzword to a hidden enabler of resilience, ensuring that enterprise systems can adapt dynamically to surging demands or unforeseen crises.
Skills, Security, and Ethics
Technology alone cannot sustain transformation. “Everyone now needs to become more tech-aware and use evolving tools effectively,” Komanduri urged, stressing the need for relentless upskilling.
On security, his message was clear: legacy systems are liabilities. Pure embeds ransomware protection by default, ensuring resilience isn’t an afterthought. And on ethics, Komanduri pointed to governance frameworks structure, ownership, access controls, and compliance as the cornerstones of enterprise trust.
The Road Ahead for Pure Storage
With India cementing its status as the world’s fastest-growing digital economy, Komanduri sees Pure Storage in lockstep with the country’s trajectory. “Every enterprise, regardless of size, will increasingly adopt some form of cloud,” he said.
From scalability and AI-embedded tools to sustainability and sovereignty, Pure positions itself not as a storage vendor but as a strategic enabler of enterprise data clouds helping businesses unlock digital strategies with resilience and efficiency at scale.