Sam Altman: AI Will Be Sold Like Electricity and Water — OpenAI Will Become the Next Infrastructure Utility

AI as Infrastructure

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman declared that AI will in the future be sold like electricity and water — metered per use by companies like OpenAI. "We see a future where intelligence is a utility," said Altman. He also acknowledged in another forum that AI is disrupting the balance between labor and capital in a way "no one knows what to do with."

Relevance

Altman's "utility" vision is not just rhetoric — it's the roadmap for the pricing model every company will face in 2–3 years.

My assessment

When Altman says "intelligence is a utility," I immediately think about licensing costs, data sovereignty, and vendor lock-in. For a Nordic company this means: ensure that the AI contracts you sign today don't lock you in by 2028. Diversification of AI vendors is good risk management — just as you don't rely on a single cloud provider.