Australian organisations are projected to spend AUD $946 million on AI-optimised infrastructure as a service in 2026, up 128.4% from 2025, according to Gartner. Spending is expected to rise further to AUD $1.5 billion in 2027 as businesses continue buying cloud infrastructure for AI use. Australia is outpacing the global growth rate forecast for the same segment in 2026. Worldwide spending on AI-optimised IaaS is projected to grow 96% to USD $42 billion, before reaching USD $66 billion in 2027. Adrian Wong, Director Analyst at Gartner, said AI-driven demand for high-performance cloud infrastructure is changing how Australian organisations prioritise cloud spending, with the ultimate goal being business value. Across the broader cloud market, Gartner forecasts total worldwide IaaS spending of USD $287.3 billion in 2026, up from USD $222.2 billion in 2025, climbing to USD $359.9 billion in 2027. Global AI-optimised IaaS spending is rising from USD $21.5 billion in 2025 to USD $42.3 billion in 2026 and USD $66.1 billion in 2027. Hardeep Singh, Senior Principal Research Analyst at Gartner, linked growth to demand for large language model training and rapid operationalisation of AI. Gartner forecasts global spending on inference workloads will reach USD $23.3 billion in 2026,