Got the link for this inside a story posted by aslan_is_0n_the_m0ve.
https://www.axios.com/2026/05/28/ai-spending-roi-enterprise-costs
Corporate leaders are starting to question whether soaring AI spending is delivering meaningful returns.
Why it matters: Companies that rushed to embrace AI are now confronting ballooning IT costs, uncertain productivity gains and growing employee skepticism.
Driving the news: Microsoft canceled most of its Claude Code licenses, in part over costs, according to The Verge, and Uber's COO said AI costs are getting "harder to justify."
An AI consultant tells Axios one of their clients recently spent half a billion dollars in a single month after failing to put usage limits on Claude licenses for employees.
Companies are citing AI's ability to automate jobs as a cause for layoffs, though Anuj Kapur, CEO of CloudBees, told Axios that workforce cuts may simply be "the only lever they can pull" to offset their AI bills.
Consumer sentiment around AI is also nosediving, and employees are rebelling against the use of the technology at work.
What they're saying: The enterprise is undergoing a "healthy swing" away from AI overuse — or "tokenmaxxing," the push to burn as many AI tokens as possible — Ali Ansari, CEO of model training firm Micro1, told Axios.
Ansari hopes this correction will push companies toward more efficient AI use.
While the market views these tools as working equally well across the enterprise, Ansari says "the reality of AI right now is that it only works for coding."
That disconnect can drive up IT bills without leading to high return on investment in agents, he said.
Friction point: Corporate AI adoption is running into four unique problems.
Use cases: "Most people default to automating tasks they dislike rather than tasks most valuable to the company," Sophia Velastegui, CEO of Velastegui Ventures and former chief AI officer at Microsoft, told Axios. Instead, they should focus on using AI to drive revenue.
Costs: One CTO told Axios that employees were using AI models to check the weather. That gets expensive fast: Enterprise AI plans are not truly "all you can eat," and even simple chatbot queries can carry heavy token costs.
Humans: We are the bottleneck to more efficient adoption, as we're still catching up on AI. Leadership isn't always helping: Throwing AI licenses at the wall and seeing what sticks (or what Velastegui calls the "thousand flowers bloom" approach) isn't leading to tangible returns, she said.
Data: When enterprises are hesitant to give AI agents unfettered access to proprietary data, those agents become less effective, Josh Pantony, CEO of Boosted.ai, which focuses on AI tools for finance, told Axios.
What we're watching: Whether companies get more disciplined about AI use. Or overcorrect and clamp down.
Let the AI bubble pop, way too much hype per return of investment
AI became a convenient excuse and Boogeyman for the Corporate World to point the public’s ire at. Rather than have people realize the Corporate World and their Greed once again fucked the country in a spectacular fashion with their own poor decision making.
The results of decades of poor decision making, over expansion, mergers that shouldn’t have happened, industry consolidation that shouldn’t have happened are hitting right about now.
This is combined with the fact that available Capital for investment is shrinking as the Boomers are either hitting retirement in mass, or are several years into retirement. So massive amounts of Capital are being transferred into safer harbors and less risky investments.
Several Industries more or less relied on periodic infusions of investor capital to remain with their heads above water. Now that it’s no longer guaranteed. They have to cut weight.
This is combined with the effect of turning off USAID. Combined with the fact companies way overhired during COVID. Tech and Entertainment in particular. So now they need to cut weight.
There’s also a plethora of unresolved racial issues. Best illustrated as an example by the Indians and their tendency to only hire Indians and or outsource operations to India once they hit management. But that’s far from the only issue of that nature.
Not to mention the onrushing Demographic Bomb. Of the fact the generations are shrinking. And the problems that will inevitably have on the economy. Given the unwritten rule of thumb for the last couple centuries has been each generation will be the same size or larger than the one that preceded it. Meaning things were built with the expectation of a certain level of consumption in mind. Which will take a degree of economic adjustment.
This is combining with something akin to the .com bubble. Meaning a bunch of people are going all in on Data Centers. Thinking it’s a get rich quick scheme. Hence the retarded monetization schemes. They’ll loose their shirts when the Bubble pops. Only the bright side we’ll likely see the opportunity for AI to come into its own much like the internet did after the .com bubble popped. And the opportunity for improved systems that’ll be less energy/water intensive than current systems to be developed and supplant current standards.
interesting, good to keep watch on how AI is affecting the corporate world
AI is working well for a friend’s small business