GenAI Economy Generates $110 Billion in Sales, Hits $175 Billion Run Rate

AI companies are making a lot of money. Apparently the revenues from this wave of technology are growing "roughly three times more rapidly than the mobile or Internet waves."

There is an interesting implicit claim here: that mobile and internet revenues grew at the same rate. It would be interesting to know if that is in fact true.

The comparison misses one thing: the internet had to build distribution first. This is exactly what Bresnahan and Trajtenberg’s General Purpose Technology theory explains.

AI didn’t start from zero. It arrived on top of cloud, SaaS, APIs, payments, mobile, app stores and enterprise software.

That’s why the revenue curve is steeper: AI is not just a new product category, it is a force multiplier on every existing one.

@paulg thanks @paulg - btw happy to catch up in person in london or oxford or wherever.

@quantam_lock If you were a college student you wouldn't feel that.

@paulg So the bubble is not gonna burst

@paulg But why I feel there’s no compelling consumer AI product so far which is life-changer. If you compare it it mobile revolution in first 5 years we got Instagram, Instant Messaging, Video Calling, Uber, etc. In AI era I don’t see any equivalent of that.

@ashirwadsingh_ @paulg AI-ass slop comment.

@paulg AI 的变现速度快，背后是企业直接把效率账算进预算里了。接下来要看毛利和留存，收入冲得快不代表所有玩家都能活得舒服。

@paulg builders keep making tomorrow look obvious five minutes after it ships

@paulg hi paul,

i am an ai company and i have lost a lot of money i am not sure this is neseccerily true. you shuold check your facts i hope this helps

all the best, cheers

@paulg $110B and the buyers still can't tell the models apart. Imagine the number once they can lol

@paulg Ai is in fashion so it has to

@paulg Isn't that just the nature of the world? I would be surprised if mobile and internet were not 3X of the earlier waves, so on and so forth going backwards.

@paulg Good future for Anthropic 😍

@azeem @paulg Let's all meet in Whatever!

@paulg But are they profitable

@paulg I’m software Engineer and I use Claude code. For us there are a lot of new exciting changes. But if I’m talking about Joe on the street, I honestly don’t find any compelling AI use-case for that demographic.

@paulg IF that is true, the cooldown will be, in theory, equally fast.

@paulg Revenue ends debates bro.