Pundits continue to argue whether generative AI is the new oil…or the new snake oil. However, as the accompanying chart demonstrates, Amazon, Microsoft, Meta and Alphabet aren’t wasting any time competing for market share as AI providers—or at least tossing huge and growing sums of money at the proposition.

This signals an epic shift in the way these firms are shaping their fundamental business strategies. Clearly, they’re confident that AI adoption will spike, and that the cloud will serve as an AI hub for almost every aspect of business. Nay-sayers and fence-sitters at companies should take notice, or risk breathing the digital dust of competitors who pass them by.

But simply recognizing the power of AI is not enough. Savvy CIOs and business leaders must rethink and retune their AI strategies—and view them broadly across a portfolio of projects. This includes understanding flexibility and lock-in issues, AI compute and infrastructure costs (including GPUs), energy costs, how AI products are evolving, and the larger data and regulatory concerns prompted by AI.

Yes, there’s currently a ton of hype about Gen AI. Yes, there will be a lot of stumbles and strikeouts as companies identify and pursue opportunities. But at the end of the day, it’s entirely clear that AI will fundamentally transform the enterprise. Big tech understands this.

Pro tip: to see the future, follow the money.