One thing keeps me up at night right now – and not because it is bad: the world is pouring investment into AI at historic levels. Data centres, chips, models – trillions. For me, the most exciting question of the coming years is not whether AI works. It is: when does all of this pay off? What has to happen for this gigantic bet to become real value creation – and who ends up footing the bill?
History offers an answer that is uncomfortable and comforting at once: technological revolutions are always too expensive at first. Railways, electrification, the internet – first came the capital, then the bubble burst, and then the technology changed the world anyway. I suspect AI will be no different. But let’s see.
Because the question would not let go of me, we ran the numbers: our AI break-even calculator (in German) shows what every paying user would have to contribute per month for 2 trillion dollars to pay off. Spoiler: it is more than most people think – which is exactly why we train people who turn AI into measurable value.
