Evans: Enterprise AI software replacement will take three to ten years
Benedict Evans · The most rational take on AI you’ll hear this year · May 31, 2026 · at 21:58
Benedict Evans explains why enterprise software replacement and AI workforce transformation will occur gradually over several years rather than overnight.
0:00 / 0:22exact quote · 22.0s
▶ Watch the full episode on YouTube → 720p mp4 · rendered on demand · StarZero watermark
“So I know people aren't going to tear out SAP and replace it with X, Y, Z. Maybe in five, in like three, five, 10 years, yes, that whole estate will look radically different. And all those jobs will have changed, but it will take, you know, two, three, four, five, 10 years, and it will take time sector by sector, and it will take time for people to work out. Oh, you could do that thing with this.”
quote is from the automated transcript, cleaned for reading: filler sounds and stutters are removed, nothing is rephrased. names can be misheard (the analysis reads context, assessments check outside sources). how →
More from Benedict Evans
Evans: AI impact equals internet and mobile, but not industrial revolution
“My most controversial opinion is that I think that AI is as big a deal as the internet or mobile and only as big a deal as the internet or mobile.”
Evans: Running Anthropic does not make Dario Amodei a labor expert
“I don't think the fact that you run AI lab suddenly gives you, or rather, and if you're going to use argument from authority, then it should be relevant to the field. So, like, I'm interested in Dario's opinions on where models are going to go in the next six …”
Evans: AI Model Providers Will Lack Pricing Power and Become Commodities
“And so it does sort of seem to me that like, if the chatbot isn't the UX and it needs to be apps and the model companies aren't going to build that. And the models themselves are basically commodities, as, at least as you can see them as users, then why would …”
Evans: Picking AI winners today is like predicting Excite versus Yahoo
“And so then you can kind of get into calling those races where, again, it's like being in 1997 and saying, well, is it going to be Excite or Yahoo? And the answer was no, generally.”
Evans: AI will transform the world even if models stop improving today
“Even if like the model stopped, you're getting better tomorrow. If this is it, and we hit a brick wall tomorrow, this is an incredibly useful technology that's going to change the world and get rolled out over the next 10 years.”