The Economics of AI Usage and What's Next For SaaS | Benedict Evans on a16z
a16z
Jun 8, 2026
Benedict Evans argues that foundation models are currently commodities, not finished products. The real value will emerge further up the stack as companies move beyond simple chatbots to solve specific, complex industry problems. We are currently in a period of extreme supply-demand disequilibrium, but the long-term future will see AI become as invisible and essential as electricity.
Key insight: The most successful current use case for LLMs is agentic coding because software developers are the ones building the tools, creating a natural feedback loop that hasn't yet been replicated in other industries like law or finance.
