Global tech budgets will grow next year mostly because memory costs more than doubled, leaving teams with more money that buys less raw compute. Gartner expects worldwide tech spending to reach $7.35 trillion in 2027, a 15% jump from this year [1]. Data centers lead that surge, on a spike in part costs Gartner calls “memflation” [1]. So my read is that your next budget raise is, in large part, a price hike.

The big picture:

The day before that forecast, Gartner ran a survey of chief executive officers (CEOs), and the two reports describe the same year from opposite ends [2]. Of the 203 bosses surveyed in April and May, 44% struggle to show their boards a cash return on artificial intelligence (AI). Seventy-five percent still plan to spend more on tech [2]. What strikes me here is that a firm can raise its budget and still lose the internal fight, as long as the increase only covers vendor price hikes.

Memory deals set that base price. TrendForce reports memory-chip contract prices rising another 10–15% in the fourth quarter and flash storage 15–20%, with server memory in very short supply [4]. Gartner expects this memflation to last through 2027. It warns that the pressure on buyers will hold back demand across the whole forecast [1]. Gartner is telling you, plainly, that the growth is not appetite.

Put the two releases side by side, and a quiet point shows up. A spending number built on input prices cannot tell a board whether the firm is doing more work. A return figure that 44% of CEOs cannot produce cannot tell it whether the money worked. Once growth comes from pricing rather than building, a budget review stops being a check on progress and turns into a fight about unit cost.

By the numbers

  • $7.35T — 2027 spend: Global tech spending is set to reach $7.35 trillion in 2027, with data center systems growing 55.5% to $1.37 trillion [1].
  • 44% — No AI return: Of 203 CEOs surveyed in April and May, 44% cannot show a cash return on AI, though 75% plan to spend more [2].
  • 10% to 15% — Memory deal prices: Standard memory-chip contract prices are set to rise another 10–15% in the fourth quarter, and flash storage 15–20% [4].
  • +50% — Agent cost miss: Firms running AI agents on uncapped token-based pricing are set to beat their early cost plans by more than 50% through 2027, against firms on flat-fee deals [3].

What I’d watch:

I am watching three lines that move on their own rules. These are the inputs a tech team can still price, which makes them the best levers for taming total spend. Every other line item is mostly set by the wider market.

  • Long-term deal terms: TrendForce expects some suppliers’ rises to trail the market average because of pricing clauses written into long-term contracts [4]. Those clauses mark the gap between market rates and last year’s base, and they are readable before signing.
  • The line you can cap: Gartner’s own advice is a strict “no telemetry, no deployment” rule, so nothing goes live without metering [3]. A team that cannot measure cost per AI agent cannot say which workload ate the budget increase.
  • Rented against bought servers: Cloud services are set to grow 25.7%, to $367 billion, against 55.5% for data center systems [1]. A firm moving steady work onto rented servers meets a different curve from one buying hardware. The math for that trade sits in the cloud bill break-even.

The catch

The honest limit is that an outlook is not a reading, and this one can move down if buyers refuse to pay [1]. The survey captures answers from April and May, which shows a mood inside firms rather than a settled market [2]. My read is that most of the growth comes from price rather than volume, though a firm that mostly buys software meets a milder jump of 14.6% [1]. What survives all three is a shift in how teams justify their spending. The figure worth defending next year is what one unit of work costs you.

At a glance

  • The Big Shift: Gartner expects global tech spending to hit $7.35 trillion in 2027, with data center systems up 55.5% while memory prices more than doubled. A survey published the day before found 44% of CEOs cannot show a cash return on AI [1][2].
  • Why It Matters: If budgets grow mostly because parts got dearer, a bigger number no longer proves a firm runs more tech. The call for returns and the renewal date arrive together, making unit cost the one measure that survives.
  • What I’d Watch: The clauses and meters that decide whether a team pays market price or its own.
  • Long-term deal pricing: Contract clauses that let some buyers’ increases trail the market, readable before signing.
  • Per-agent metering: Tracking that shows which workload used the budget, the first step to any cap.
  • Rented versus bought servers: Cloud services growing at 25.7% against data centers at 55.5%, two curves for the same work.
  • The Catch: Forecasts can be revised down if buyers balk, the survey describes a mood rather than a market, and the price-over-volume reading is my own. Software-heavy buyers face a milder 14.6%.

Related reading

Sources

[1] Gartner, “Gartner Forecasts Worldwide IT Spending to Grow 15% in 2027, Totaling $7.35 Trillion”, 21 October 2026 — https://www.gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2026-10-21-gartner-forecasts-worldwide-it-spending-to-grow-15-percent-in-2027-totaling-7-point-35-trillion [2] Gartner, “Gartner Says 44% of CEOs Struggle to Demonstrate AI Financial Returns as Technology Becomes Central to Growth”, 20 October 2026 — https://www.gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2026-10-20-gartner-says-44-percent-of-ceos-struggle-to-demonstrate-ai-financial-returns-as-technology-becomes-central-to-growth [3] Gartner, “Gartner Identifies the Top AI Trends in Infrastructure and IT Operations for 2027”, 26 October 2026 — https://www.gartner.com/en/newsroom/press-releases/2026-10-26-gartner-identifies-the-top-ai-trends-in-infrastructure-and-it-operations-for-2027 [4] TrendForce, “AI Server Demand Sustains Memory Contract Price Increases in 4Q26, While Consumer-Side Pressure Persists”, 30 September 2026 — https://www.trendforce.com/presscenter/news/20260930-13258.html