AI NewsOpenAI poaches Uber India chief to lead its biggest market outside the U.S.

OpenAI poaches Uber India chief to lead its biggest market outside the U.S.

12:13 AM IST · June 27, 2026

OpenAI is making yet another big, visible bet on India. It has appointed former Uber India and South Asia president Prabhjeet Singh as its first managing director for the country to scale its presence in what it has called its second-largest market after the U.S. Singh, who announced his resignation from Uber on Friday, will join OpenAI in September and report to Kiran Mani, the company’s managing director for Asia-Pacific, the company told TechCrunch. He will be responsible for OpenAI’s performance in India across consumer growth, enterprise adoption, partnerships, regulatory engagement, and operations, the company said. The hire marks OpenAI’s latest investment in India. The companyopened its first office in New Delhilast August and earlier this year said it wouldestablish new offices in Mumbai and Bengaluru. In 2024, it hired former Truecaller and Meta executive Pragya Misra to lead public policy and partnerships before expanding her role to head of strategy and global affairs last year. OpenAI had earlierbrought on former Twitter India head Rishi Jaitlyas a senior adviser to help establish its engagement with the Indian government on AI policy. Over the past few months, OpenAI struck partnerships in the nation spanninghigher education,enterprise payments,AI-powered commerce, andweb streaming, whilealso becoming partof the country’sgrowing data center build-out. OpenAI has pointed toIndia’s rapidly growing adoption of ChatGPTas a sign of the market’s importance. Indian conglomerates Reliance and Tata Group are also among its early partners in the market. The company has simultaneously ramped up hiring in India, withopeningsincluding AI deployment engineers, developer experience engineers, a developer marketing lead, a partner director, and solutions engineers. India has emerged as one of the key battlegrounds for U.S. AI companies, driven by its vast developer base, more than a billion internet users, and surging demand for generative AI. Rival Anthropicopened its India office in Bengaluruin late 2025 and earlier this yearnamed former Microsoft India managing director Irina Ghoseas its India head.