The global AI industry needs to earn $6 trillion in annual revenue by 2031 to justify the capital being deployed to build data centres around the world, Bain & Company said in its annual global technology report.

Existing consumer and enterprise AI services may generate as much as $1.8 trillion of that sum, leaving $4.2 trillion in new revenue that needs to be created. Bain said the shortfall must come from nascent segments such as autonomous machines, robotics, drug discovery, mental health and energy generation.

“What the industry needs is a wave of innovation that will dwarf what mobile and cloud unlocked,” said David Crawford, the report’s lead author. He added that AI infrastructure is being built well ahead of the demand curve, and funding it sustainably would require adding about 1 per cent to annual global GDP growth.

Companies led by Microsoft, Google, Amazon, Meta and Oracle are investing trillions in data centres. Bain estimates annual AI infrastructure spending could reach $1.5 trillion by 2031, with data centre sizes and costs doubling roughly every 12 to 16 months.