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- IT services push global tech spending past $6 trillion
IT services push global tech spending past $6 trillion
The AI Mandate:Winning in a New Economy, IT Services Spend Surges Past $6 Trillion, Hyperscalers Double Down on Infrastructure
Zack Tembi
February 09, 2026
Executive AI Security Roundtable in LA, IT Services Spend Surges Past $6 Trillion, Hyperscalers Double Down on Infrastructure
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Welcome to this week’s edition of CIOsurge!
This week:
Community member Cy Khormaee (Microsoft, Google, Lightspeed, Harvard Business School, and now CEO of Aegis AI Security) just released his new book, The AI Mandate: Winning in the New Economy. Get your free copy and meet Cy
Global IT spending is set to pass $6 trillion as enterprises lean harder on services firms to manage AI complexity, accelerating transformation but risking long-term dependency.
Google’s $185B infrastructure push shows AI is becoming core enterprise infrastructure, forcing CIOs to rethink capacity planning, vendor strategy, and long-term cost curves.
Let’s make this week a game-changer.
Stay sharp. Stay ahead.
The AI Mandate:Winning in a New Economy
Community member Cy Khormaee (Microsoft, Google, Lightspeed, Harvard Business School, and now CEO of Aegis AI Security) just released his new book, The AI Mandate: Winning in the New Economy. Cy has been on the front lines of the AI revolution, from building Google’s phishing and malware defenses to leading AegisAI’s autonomous email security platform. We have a limited number of free copies available exclusively for the CIOsurge community.
IT services push global tech spending past $6 trillion
Gartner projects global IT spending will reach $6.15 trillion in 2026, up 10.8% year over year, with IT services remaining the largest segment at nearly $1.9 trillion. Even as AI drives massive data center and software growth, enterprises are increasingly turning to consultants and managed service providers to guide AI adoption and execution.
What this tells me is simple: complexity is winning. As AI reshapes infrastructure, software, and operations, organizations are leaning heavily on third parties to design, integrate, and run it all. The CIO role isn’t shrinking, but the ecosystem around it is exploding, and services firms are filling the execution gaps fast.
For IT leaders, the risk is losing strategic ownership while outsourcing speed. Services can accelerate transformation, but they can also become permanent dependencies. The smartest CIOs will use partners to move faster while building internal capability in parallel, especially around AI governance, data architecture, and cost control. Otherwise, spend will keep climbing without corresponding control.
- Zack Tembi
Google doubles down on AI infrastructure with $185B investment
Alphabet plans to boost capital expenditures to as much as $185 billion in 2026, more than double last year’s spend, as rising AI and cloud demand strain capacity. Google Cloud revenue surged 48% year over year, reinforcing the company’s aggressive buildout of compute infrastructure to support frontier models, enterprise workloads, and internal AI-driven services.
This level of hyperscaler spending signals that AI demand is not a short-term spike, it is becoming core infrastructure. When providers are committing hundreds of billions to compute, it tells us the enterprise appetite for AI workloads is accelerating faster than anyone forecasted.
For CIOs, this has two implications. First, cloud capacity and pricing dynamics are going to stay tight. Second, hyperscalers like Google are positioning themselves as vertically integrated AI platforms, not just compute vendors. Vendor strategy, lock-in risk, and long-term cost curves should now be front-and-center in every cloud roadmap discussion.
- Zack Tembi
🗞️ At A Glance
💡 CIO Spotlights
USAA brings in Dan Griffiths as CIO to modernize secure digital experiences
USAA appointed veteran banking technologist Dan Griffiths as CIO, effective February 5, 2026, to lead platform modernization and cybersecurity.
Griffiths previously served as global CIO at Santander and held senior tech roles across TD Bank, Barclays, Lehman Brothers, and JPMorgan Chase.
He’s tasked with simplifying digital journeys while strengthening reliability and security for USAA’s 14 million military-affiliated members.
GDMS elevates longtime cybersecurity leader Ron Moore to CIO
Ron Moore, formerly CISO and deputy CIO, was promoted to CIO and VP of IT at General Dynamics Mission Systems, while temporarily retaining oversight of security.
A 10-year GDMS veteran, Moore brings deep experience in cyber policy, infrastructure, and incident response from both federal and commercial sectors.
Leadership says Moore will drive stronger cybersecurity, operational efficiency, and IT modernization to support mission-critical defense programs.
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