At the ongoing India AI Impact Summit 2026, homegrown AI startup Sarvam AI has unveiled its latest open-source Edge AI models. Alongside that, the brand has also confirmed a bunch of new partnerships to make AI more accessible for India. One such is the conversational AI chatbot that will arrive via future HMD feature phones.
HMD feature phones will be AI-ready soon, thanks to Sarvam AI
At the HMD booth in the India AI Impact Summit 2026, CEO and VP of HMD India, Ravi Kunwar, announced the brand's partnership with Sarvam AI for future-ready feature phones. As part of this collaboration, Sarvam's Edge AI models will be used to provide end-to-end conversational chatbot support to consumers.
This means that users will now be able to gain all the benefits of AI right from their Rs 2,000 phone without needing to fiddle with a smartphone or laptop. This has been made possible with Sarvam 30B, the AI startup's latest LLM model with support for a 32,000-token context window aimed at real-time conversational use.
Sarvam co-founder Pratyush Kumar confirmed that this new model can fit into megabits and can run on any existing smartphone and/or feature phone processor. While it won't be able to perform every task that AI chatbots have grown to accommodate, HMD phones will still be able to handle the day-to-day conversational queries of most individuals.
For more complex operations like image generation, video manipulation, file analysis and more, Sarvam also has a 128,000-token window for Sarvam 30B and a dedicated new model 105B. Both these LLMs will target devices like smartphones, laptops and even smart cars. The brand has also collaborated with Qualcomm and German car-maker Bosch to achieve this feat.
That said, Sarvam's partnership with HMD stands out the most since it truly democratises AI, making it accessible to every consumer group in India. It is unclear which future HMD phones will support Sarvam AI and when they will launch.
There is also the question if every AI action will be performed offline or some will require an active internet connection. We will know for sure when consumers get their hands on the feature phones.
