\u2018Never trust billionaires\u2019 – Analyst suspicious of major AI firms\u2019 calls for a slowdown \u2013 but has other answers to AI woes<\/a><\/p>\nSurging electricity demand from AI and data centres is driving enterprises to invest heavily in energy generation, storage and management assets, blurring the traditional line between energy consumers and power providers, Plummer said.<\/p>\n
As energy becomes a strategic, software-defined asset, organisations will need new capabilities to optimise production, storage and consumption.<\/p>\n
Power was no longer the domain of a firm\u2019s facilities manager. The CFO and CTO also had to get into the mix.<\/p>\n
Plummer said some of the power predictions were best applied to the US, but there is a worldwide trend towards self-generation with solar, and batteries like those recently launched by Aotea Energy in New Zealand that treat the battery as a commodity to store power (with solar panels not necessarily in the mix) and sophisticated software for power consumers to act as their own gentailer as they buy, store or sell electricity at different times of the day.<\/p>\n
![\"Image]()
Image \/ Getty Creative<\/p>\n
7. Insurers drive AI governance<\/p>\n
By 2030, insurers \u2013 not regulators \u2013 will drive AI governance, as strict underwriting standards for AI liability insurance will be required to reduce insurance costs. <\/p>\n
Organisations are shifting from policy-based AI governance to operational governance that embeds controls directly into AI systems and workflows, Gartner says. <\/p>\n
As AI risks and liability concerns grow, insurers are expected to influence governance practices by encouraging stronger oversight, risk management and technical controls. <\/p>\n
Gartner recommends organisations implement AI governance technologies, test controls in real environments, and establish runtime oversight to support both innovation and accountability. <\/p>\n
In the here and now, however, Plummer said AI insurance was still very much an emerging area. Only 1% of large organisations had dedicated AI liability insurance. It\u2019s more typical for the new technology to be covered between cyber security, general liability and practice liability policies.<\/p>\n
It was also a moving feast, with AI agents entering the mainstream over just the past few months, and the rise of physical robot AI pending.<\/p>\n
But there was also a more timeless theme.<\/p>\n
\u201cInsurance companies will fight to not pay. We know the underwriters will drive the premiums up. We know that the risk may be higher than we expected,\u201d Plummer said.<\/p>\n
\u201cBut we have to put it in place to potentially handle those white swan, black swan events.\u201d<\/p>\n
8. Burner business: Fast followers made obsolete<\/p>\n
By 2029, 25% of Fortune Global 500 companies will continuously innovate componentised AI-powered offerings, creating a competitive moat that obsoletes fast-follower strategies. <\/p>\n
The idea here is that market leaders will reinvent themselves every six months. That means firms who today adopt a \u201cfast-follower\u201d strategy will no longer quickly catch up after watching the first-mover do all the legwork, Plummer says.<\/p>\n
As AI-native competitors introduce more customised, efficient and scalable offerings, established organisations face growing pressure to innovate or risk losing customers, talent and market share, Gartner says.<\/p>\n
Although you want to rein in token costs, you also don\u2019t want to overly prioritise controls and internal efficiency gains at the expense of innovation.<\/p>\n
9. Tracking token consumption in real time<\/p>\n
By 2028, 60% of Fortune Global 500 companies will embed AI FinOps (financial operations) control in inference (AI-speak for when a AI prompt is entered), shifting cost governance from reactive reporting to real-\u00adtime optimisation.<\/p>\n
The Herald asked Gartner analyst Robert Naegle, an expert on AI costs, a couple of simple questions: \u201cWhat is a token?\u201d and \u201cIs the price of tokens going up or down?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe did a piece of research looking at the top 20 AI tools,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat we found is they all use the word \u2018token\u2019, but for all 20 it means something different. <\/p>\n
\u201cSo the price per token is different. The consumption requirement of token is different. <\/p>\n
\u201cFor a typical task, it\u2019ll use a certain number of tokens, input tokens and output tokens, and so the tokenisation of consumption is really complex.\u201d<\/p>\n
A single prompt typically involves many tokens \u2013 or billable units, as AI models continue their shift to consumption-based pricing rather than a set per-user, per-month fee.<\/p>\n
![\"Gartner]()
Gartner surveyed the top 20 AI players and found each had a different definition of a token, or billable unit of consumption. Image \/ Getty Creative<\/p>\n
The net result: \u201cAI spending is becoming harder to predict and control as organisations scale AI tools and agentic workflows, driving a shift from retrospective cost reporting to real-time AI FinOps [financial operations] governance.\u201d<\/p>\n
As AI becomes a larger operational expense, organisations will increasingly focus on measuring cost per task and token efficiency to maintain margins and maximise value, Gartner says.<\/p>\n
Gartner recommends organisations implement runtime cost controls, deploy inference-path telemetry and make cost governance a core requirement of AI platforms and applications. <\/p>\n
In plainer language: keep tabs on things so people don\u2019t use expensive AI tools for simple tasks.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne of the things we recommend to clients is that you budget based on value rather than based on cost of input. So think about what\u2019s the value AI creates. What\u2019s that value worth to you, and then spend according to value.\u201d<\/p>\n
In practical terms, that could mean capping individual employees\u2019 monthly spending on AI tokens or other charges.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, staff at big organisations with consumption-based AI pricing also had to realise that careless consumption costs money, Plummer said.<\/p>\n
So does polite consumption. If you always type \u201cthank you\u201d after an AI delivers a response or completes a task, that\u2019s costing your employer money. (This author does wonder if it\u2019s a worthwhile hedge for the day when robots take over.)<\/p>\n
![\"Image]()
Image \/ Getty Creative<\/p>\n
10. New evidence custodians<\/p>\n
By 2030, 80% of the Fortune Global 500 will contractually make their CIO (or CAIO \u2013 chief AI officer) the \u201cevidence custodian\u201d for AI accountability.<\/p>\n
As AI becomes embedded in critical business processes and decisions, organisations face increasing pressure to ensure accountability, transparency and oversight of AI actions, Gartner says.<\/p>\n
This is expanding the role of technology leaders in overseeing AI accountability and ensuring governance guardrails are applied consistently across the organisation.<\/p>\n
Gartner recommends organisations assess their digital evidence management capabilities and establish clear accountability for AI actions to support responsible AI governance. <\/p>\n
What\u2019s the end point, in an age when AI can cause commercial damage or even potentially death?<\/p>\n
\u201cSomebody\u2019s going to jail,\u201d Plummer said, channelling a lyric from Don Henley\u2019s New York Minute. <\/p>\n
\u201cYou need to know who\u2019s going to jail \u2013 even if you plan to defend them in court so they don\u2019t go to jail.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chris Keall is an Auckland-based member of the Herald\u2019s business team. He joined the Herald in 2018 and is the technology editor and a senior business writer.<\/p>\n
Chris Keall travelled to the Gold Coast courtesy of Gartner.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By year-end 2030, 80% of frontline workers employed by international companies will be assisted by physical AI systems…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":603747,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[9055,18516,308,365,3471,95,665,363,364,27245,8556,91613,2082,71,3273,1333,18326,305,330,5840,5978,102462,3180,111,139,425,69,37005,34592,11393,145,223,165,8229,3010,4770,14905,1533,17708,19985,190287],"class_list":["post-603746","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-9055","tag-18516","tag-actually","tag-ai","tag-among","tag-and","tag-around","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-beyond","tag-companies","tag-floors","tag-for","tag-from","tag-future","tag-get","tag-handle","tag-have","tag-investments","tag-least","tag-might","tag-moneys","tag-near","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-now","tag-nz","tag-predictions","tag-ready","tag-robots","tag-technology","tag-the","tag-their","tag-they","tag-top","tag-walking","tag-whether","tag-will","tag-workplace","tag-worth","tag-zooming"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/603746","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=603746"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/603746\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/603747"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=603746"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=603746"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=603746"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}