The Real AI Budget Question: Where Should We Spend More?
CIO, Monday, October 5th, 2026
CIOs should stop just controlling consumption-based AI spend and act as capital allocators, investing more where AI drives business results.
An advisor writing in CIO.com says AI budget conversations start with token costs and model pricing but should end with which investments drive revenue, margin, customer satisfaction and time to market.
Consumption-based AI behaves like a utility bill rather than an owned asset, and the author calls constraining deployments or renegotiating contracts as costs rise the wrong path.
Instead, CIOs should think like capital allocators, borrow finance disciplines to focus on value realization, and decide where the business should invest more.