Uber institutes monthly caps on employee use of AI

Summary

Uber blew through its annual AI coding budget in four months and is now imposing monthly caps on token usage per employee, with a $1,500 base tier. Other major companies like Priceline, Walmart, Amazon, and Microsoft are also moving toward tighter controls on AI access. The report highlights a growing corporate debate over whether AI spending is translating into real product improvements.

• Uber consumed its full-year AI coding budget in just four months and raised the budget with new restrictions.
• Uber's monthly token cap starts at $1,500 per tool per employee, with higher tiers reaching six figures.
• CEO Dara Khosrowshahi noted that about 10% of committed code is now built by AI agents.
• Priceline is capping developers at $2,000 in tokens per month, while Walmart, Amazon, and Microsoft are tightening controls.
• Uber is also cutting 23% of its people division, though those layoffs are not AI-related.
• The link between more AI code commits and better consumer products remains unclear.
• Companies are moving away from incentivizing high token usage toward monitoring spend efficiency.