Lets focus on the tech firms that produce software.
Two things should happen if AI proliferates into software development:
1) Increasing top line - due to more projects being taken by enabling labour to be more productive
2) Operating margin increasing - due to labour input declining and taking more cost-reduction projects
If those 2 things dont occur - the AI investment was a waste of money from a financial perspective. And this is before I even discount the cash flows by the cost of capital of these high-risk projects (high discount rate).
At some point everyone will be analysed in this manner. Only Nvidia is winning as it stands, ironically, not because of LLMs. But rather because they sell the hardware that LLMs operate on.
I would also add that many (most?) companies/entities do not sell software but have large IT departments that could write software for internal consumption. Think Exxon, BP, Caterpillar, Airlines, Gov Labs/agencies, DOD, etc...
Internally, they could actually write 1,000X more software and it will be absorbed by internal customers. They will buy less packaged software from tech firms (unless it's infrastructure), internally they could keep the same headcount or more, as AI allows them to write more software.
If we need those two things to occur, then any money spent not on salesmen and golf tee times is a waste. There are so many outside factors that aren't product features that make or break a company and a product's success and while we, as software developers who work on the product and its features want to believe things like code quality are relevant, but they're not as important as we'd like to think.
Lets focus on the tech firms that produce software.
Two things should happen if AI proliferates into software development:
1) Increasing top line - due to more projects being taken by enabling labour to be more productive 2) Operating margin increasing - due to labour input declining and taking more cost-reduction projects
If those 2 things dont occur - the AI investment was a waste of money from a financial perspective. And this is before I even discount the cash flows by the cost of capital of these high-risk projects (high discount rate).
At some point everyone will be analysed in this manner. Only Nvidia is winning as it stands, ironically, not because of LLMs. But rather because they sell the hardware that LLMs operate on.