Bloomberg Surveillance · Friday, July 17, 2026
Dan Ives believes the true monetization of AI will come from infrastructure and application layers, rather than solely from AI models. He likens current AI development to building a factory for cars, with the next phase focusing on the assembly lines and operations.
“The reality is that it's anthropic and open AIS world and everyone else paying rent relative to the models. Gemini clearly narrowing the gap China. You're going to continue to see you very good models come out of there. But it's my view, when you talk about broader spending, the trillions dollars spending you're in CNAI, it's less about the models, it's about the data. It's about ultimately the build out, and I think that is something that we get validated to Q.”
“I think it's it's the application infrastructure layer that's going to really be the hearts and lungs. Because if you think about today, all the data center is getting built, those data centers are going to be it'll be like a factory for cars. You build out the factory, but now you actually need the lines. What's the operation When you look at as more and more companies on the use cases that's enterprise, that's software, that's.”
“Use cases, confidently applayer won't become commoditized.”