As AI Costs Climb, Knowing When to Pull Back Becomes Critical
CIO Dive, Thursday, November 5th, 2026
An Ocient report says rising AI infrastructure costs are forcing CIOs to decide which AI projects to fund and which to cut.
An Ocient report finds agentic AI is increasing query volumes, data processing needs, latency demands and infrastructure costs for enterprises.
Fewer than one-quarter of tech leaders surveyed said they can support growing AI workloads without significant changes, and only 38% have seen significant ROI from AI investments.
Nearly one-quarter have reduced or paused underperforming initiatives, while about 45% have increased investment in successful ones.
Leaders weigh security risk, financial return, accuracy and cost at scale nearly equally when deciding what to keep, many are adding governance requirements and AI usage and spending controls, and the piece cites Gartner data that global AI spend will nearly double in 2026.