Inference Economics

GPU prices have doubled in the last six months, from $4.40 to $8.08 per GPU-hour. But AI prices are falling. How can that be?

It is not a simple answer. Higher GPU costs are likely to remain while the industry races to build out new data centers. Every component of the buildout is increasing in cost, from concrete to copper to credit.¹ Above all, electricity remains the limiting factor, which Oracle is experiencing : last week it invoked force majeure on its New Mexico campus after the natural-gas pipeline feeding it slipped by six months.²

Yesterday, Anthropic released a new model & cut its price. Ninety minutes later, OpenAI did the same.

Most business AI use is the messy middle: multi-step workflows that need a smart enough model at a price a company can afford. It is the most important part of the market today, & it is where the competition is fiercest. The price cuts are the evidence.

In June, Anthropic set the frontier price at $10 & $50 per million tokens with Fable 5. In July, OpenAI answered with GPT-5.6 Sol at $5 & $30, matching that capability at a third of the cost per task.