Like parents getting a big phone bill because their tween has been secretly playing a freemium game, companies are reeling from the sticker shock of their staff’s AI use. And now, many are looking for ways to bring down the cost of employees’ use of AI tools that have become mandatory at some jobs.
One culprit is toxenmaxxing, the practice of using as many AI tokens as possible to let everyone know you work somewhere that’s at the forefront of next-gen emailing methodologies:
- Axios reported that one company recently spent $500,000 in a month because it didn’t put usage limits on Claude licenses for employees.
- Uber COO Andrew Macdonald said this week that the “link is not there” between increased spend on tokens and results.
- Amazon shut down an internal leaderboard designed to encourage token use. Other companies taking similar measures include Meta, Microsoft, Salesforce, and DoorDash.
Looking ahead…one CEO told CNBC that the AI tech, which has not come down in price as expected, “costs the same as people,” and that the AI budget is coming at the expense of future headcount. Nearly all corporate AI usage is done on the most expensive models, the CEO also said, making it a priority to find cheaper options for less complicated tasks.—DL