AI Costs Surge Worldwide: Are Businesses Getting Value for Money?

Artificial Intelligence has shifted from a promising tool to the core part of modern business even as the old tensions around transparency, ethics, and data protection stick around. The scale of investment shows just how firmly AI has moved from experimentation into long-term strategy for businesses.

Where the money is going

MarketsandMarkets estimates the global AI markets worth at $371.7 billion in 2025, with growth on track to reach $2,407 billion by 2032 at a 30.6% CAGR. That long runway reflects what executives are signaling that AI is no longer a convenient option but a structural shift in how businesses will operate. 
This trend again resurfaces in Deloitte’s 2025 survey of 1,854 executives across Europe and the Middle East that shows 85% of organizations increased AI spending over the past year, and 91% expect to expand it again in 2025. Notably also is leadership involvement, as 10% of the organizations have the CEO personally leading their AI agenda. Proof that AI has become strategically centered in how companies operate. That top-level push appears to be accelerating adoption. McKinsey has also reported that 88% of organizations now deploy AI in at least one business function, up from 78% last year.
Perhaps spending is rising because expectations are. Analysis by SAP shows companies projecting an average ROI of 16% this year, with returns nearly doubling to 31% within two years. Amongst the companies, 79% expect to see positive returns in under three years, and most anticipate that AI will become fully embedded in business processes by 2029. Only a miniscule 3% remain adamant that AI will never become central to their operations.

These projections are surely shaping spending behavior worldwide. Gartner forecasts that global generative AI spend will reach $644 billion in 2025, a 76.4% jump from 2024; one of the fastest year-on-year increases in enterprise tech spending this decade. 
 Looking into Sector-level, the Leading global AI investment at $91 billion is Healthcare, accounted for by diagnostics and personalized care. Retail and e-commerce follow at $69.4 billion, focusing on inventory optimization, pricing systems, and customer analytics. The impact isn’t limited to large enterprises as small businesses using AI report notable gains of their own, including increased productivity (87%), effectiveness (86%), and business growth (86%). 
The same concentration appears in private investment where the U.S. remains the dominant investor. Stanford reports private AI investment reached $109.1 billion in the U.S., which is nearly 12 times China’s ($9.3 billion) and 24 times that of the U.K. 's ($4.5 billion). The gap is way more in generative AI, the U.S. outpaced the combined investment of China, the EU, and the U.K. by $25.4 billion, up from a $21.8 billion in 2023. 

Does the value match the spend? 

“Everyone is asking their organization to adopt AI, even if they don’t know what the output is. There is so much hype that I think companies are expecting it to just magically solve everything,” a telecommunications and media executive told Deloitte. 
Among active adopters, 72% cite integration and usage as their biggest challenge, and 70% point to data and privacy concerns, according to Service Direct. As companies expand AI security spending, they face rising risks of tool overlap, redundant configurations, and costly compliance layers, especially in regulated industries. 
The answer depends on whether businesses are willing to re-engineer how they work. Investment alone won’t deliver returns. The gains arrive only when companies rebuild processes around AI rather than layering it onto old systems.