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AI Cost & Economics

26 summarised stories about AI Cost & Economics, each linking back to the original source. Browse all topics →

Tuesday, 28 April 2026

Locked, stocked, and losing budget: AI vendor lock-in bites back

The Register 2 months ago

Enterprise organizations face mounting vendor lock-in as they discover switching between AI providers requires far more effort than anticipated, with 58 percent of migration attempts failing or requiring significantly more effort than expected. OpenAI raised GPT-5.2 pricing from $1.25 to $5.75 per input token, while Anthropic shifted Claude enterprise from fixed to usage-based pricing potentially doubling costs, and GitHub Copilot restricted compute availability and discontinued Opus model access. Companies increasingly dependent on specific vendor platforms, APIs, and integrated workflows will face sustained price increases as AI providers transition toward token-based pricing models reflecting real infrastructure costs.

Microsoft's GitHub shifts to metered AI billing amid cost crisis

The Register 2 months ago

GitHub is switching Copilot from request-based to usage-based token billing on June 1, 2026, after subsidizing expensive inference costs became unsustainable. Copilot Pro subscribers will receive 1,000 AI Credits per month at $0.01 per credit, with complex models like Anthropic's Opus seeing pricing multipliers increase from 7.5x to 27x. Customers will face variable costs based on token consumption and can define overflow budgets or wait for monthly resets, while subscription rates remain unchanged but more expensive model usage is now explicitly metered.