Big Tech Earnings: AI Spending Under Scrutiny as Companies Report Results

Major technology companies face intensifying scrutiny over their artificial intelligence investments as they report fourth-quarter 2025 earnings. Analysts are forecasting cloud infrastructure spending to exceed $146 billion in 2026, representing more than 17 percent growth, as companies race to build AI capabilities.

Amazon and OpenAI Partnership

Amazon Web Services signed a landmark $38 billion deal with OpenAI in November 2025, marking its first major contract with the ChatGPT maker. The e-commerce giant has also invested significantly in OpenAI competitor Anthropic, which recently raised a $10 billion funding round at a $350 billion valuation. Despite these investments, Amazon faces pressure to explain its AI strategy and prove it can compete effectively.

Google's Massive CapEx

Alphabet lifted its 2025 capital expenditure forecast to $91-93 billion and is expecting a "significant increase" in spending for 2026, with analysts projecting over $115 billion. Google has signed deals with both OpenAI and Anthropic, including a multibillion-dollar agreement bringing over a gigawatt of AI compute capacity by 2026. The company also secured a deal with Apple to power the iPhone's Siri overhaul with its Gemini AI model.

Microsoft and Tesla Updates

Microsoft's Azure cloud platform has been growing faster than AWS, benefiting from its close partnership with OpenAI. The company announced a $30 billion commitment to UK technology development at Davos, part of a broader effort to expand AI infrastructure globally. NVIDIA's deployment of 120,000 GPUs for AI training reflects the scale of investment required.

Tesla presents a different profile, with CEO Elon Musk promoting visions of autonomous vehicles and robots while automotive deliveries fell 8.6 percent in 2025 to 1.64 million units. Market analysts from J.P. Morgan note that AI is spreading beyond pure tech into banks, healthcare, logistics, and utilities, creating a clear split between AI-driven winners and the rest of the market.