Dylan Patel: token spend keeps climbing as lower prices unlock new use cases and ROI rises
dylan522p · x · 2026-09-25
- SemiAnalysis's Dylan Patel shares an observation on AI spend: every time growth tempts him into token budgeting, Anthropic and OpenAI "save" him via price drops or efficiency gains.
- His internal project Astra spiked then settled lower, and on Opus 5.5 spend for current use cases appears reduced.
- The cycle: people keep finding new things to do with models, so total spend rises again while ROI keeps increasing — falling unit prices expand usage rather than cut costs.
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