Sarvam expands edge AI to phones, cars, and smart glasses

Indian AI company Sarvam is expanding beyond its enterprise roots, announcing plans to deploy its new AI models across feature phones, cars, and its own smart glasses. Speaking at the India AI Impact Summit in New Delhi, the company, which is backed by investors including Lightspeed, Peak XV, and Khosla Ventures, detailed its shift toward consumer use cases. Sarvam plans to use edge AI—which refers to AI models that run on local devices rather than in the cloud—to bring these capabilities directly to users. The company’s plans include targeting feature phones, which are basic mobile phones with limited capabilities compared to smartphones, to make the technology accessible to a broader audience. Previously, the company operated largely in the enterprise market, offering its voice-focused models for use cases like customer support.

The company’s edge models can run on most phones with existing processors and work offline. However, it is not clear if all the AI features showcased at the event will work offline. To optimize these models, Sarvam has worked with Qualcomm to tune them for the chipset manufacturer’s processors. Vivek Raghavan, Sarvam co-founder, stated that the collaboration with Qualcomm Technologies can accelerate how the company takes sovereign AI—referring to AI systems developed to align with national interests or data sovereignty—from research to deployment. Raghavan added that this will allow Sarvam to design models and applications that run closer to the edge, safeguard data, and remain ready for adoption at scale.

To distribute these models, Sarvam is teaming with HMD to bring a conversational AI assistant to Nokia and HMD phones. A video demonstration showed a user clicking a dedicated AI button on a feature phone to converse with an AI assistant in a local language to get guidance on government schemes or local markets. Beyond mobile devices, Sarvam is working with German engineering company Bosch to bring AI assistants to cars. The startup also showcased its own AI smart glasses, named Sarvam Kaze. Designed and manufactured in India, the smart glasses are described by co-founder Pratyush Kumar as a “builders’ device” and are scheduled to be available in May.

Why it matters

This launch marks a significant strategic pivot for Sarvam, which has historically focused on enterprise voice models, signaling an aggressive expansion into consumer hardware and mass-market mobile devices.