Google controls approximately 25 percent of global AI compute capacity through 3.8 million TPUs and 1.3 million GPUs deployed across its data center footprint. Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian argues that demand and revenue margins justify the infrastructure spend, signaling that the company sees AI as a durable advantage rather than a cyclical investment.

The arithmetic is compelling and terrifying in equal measure. The barriers to entry in AI are no longer talent or algorithms—those are commoditized, available on GitHub. The barriers are energy, fabrication capacity, and the capital to acquire both. ASML controls the only machines that make cutting-edge semiconductors. Google controls one quarter of the capacity those chips deliver. Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta split the remainder, with the inevitable consolidation toward duopoly.