Silicon Valley's AI Spending Spree Hits Reality: Major Companies Cut Costs After Budget Blowouts

After encouraging aggressive "tokenmaxxing" early this year, major tech companies are now reining in AI spending as costs spiral—Uber reportedly exhausted its annual AI budget in months, while Meta and others have cut Claude licenses and killed internal usage leaderboards. NEA investor Tiffany Luck weighs in on the tension between AI ambitions and actual returns on investment.

Why it matters: The shift from unlimited AI experimentation to cost discipline signals a maturation in enterprise AI adoption and could reshape how companies evaluate generative AI ROI going forward.