AI needs $6T in annual revenue to justify data centre boom

The <a href="https://www.thenationalnews.com/opinion/comment/2026/09/27/ai-technology-regulation/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer" title="https://www.thenationalnews.com/opinion/comment/2026/09/27/ai-technology-regulation/">artificial intelligence</a> industry needs to become creative with new propositions to earn $6 trillion in annual revenue by 2031 and justify the capital being deployed for data centres, a new report from Bain and Company has shown. Revenue from new product development is projected to become the biggest contributor to the industry, estimated to generate about $4.2 trillion to fund <a href="https://www.thenationalnews.com/future/space/2026/09/25/google-data-center-space-launch-ai/" target="_blank" rel="noreferrer" title="https://www.thenationalnews.com/future/space/2026/09/25/google-data-center-space-launch-ai/">the booming technology's global market</a> within the next half-decade, the US consultancy said in its latest technology report series on Tuesday. That segment would include innovations in search, advertising, autonomy and physical AI, analysts at Boston-based Bain said. Enterprise productivity would require $1 trillion to $1.4 trillion in revenue in order to support gains in areas such as software development, sales, marketing, customer service and IT operations, they said.