The Google logo on the Google house at CES 2024, an annual consumer electronics trade show, in Las Vegas on Jan. 10, 2024. Steve Marcus/Reuters
Tech giant Alphabet beat Wall Street expectations for its latest quarter, the company reported on Feb. 4. It said it plans to more than double capital spending this year, a sharp escalation that puts the Google parent at the center of an intensifying U.S. investment cycle spanning Big Tech, defense manufacturing, and industrial equipment.
Executives characterized the spending surge as a direct response to soaring demand for artificial intelligence computational resources (also known as AI compute)—and an increasingly tight supply environment for the power, land, and hardware needed to build it.
