ServiceNow's 5-for-1 Stock Split: What It Reveals About the Future of AI

Of all the documents that define our modern lives, I think the most revealing is the humble cookie notice. You’ve seen them a million times—those pop-ups that are the digital equivalent of a speed bump, forcing you to click "accept" before you can get to what you actually want. We’re presented with a wall of text about first-party cookies, third-party cookies, analytics, and ad-delivery trackers, and our collective response is a universal sigh and a click to make it go away.

We’re conditioned to ignore the plumbing. We don’t think about the javascript that fails to load, giving us a page that says 'Access to this page has been denied.' We just want the machine to work. But right now, at this very moment in history, ignoring the plumbing is the biggest mistake you could possibly make. Because while we’ve all been mesmerized by the user-facing magic of AI—the chatbots, the image generators—the real, earth-shattering revolution is happening one layer deeper. It’s happening in the plumbing.

We're witnessing the construction of a new global infrastructure, one as fundamental as the electrical grid or the railroad network. And the companies laying the tracks and building the power plants aren't just tech companies; they are the architects of the 21st century.

The Foundation We Can't See

When people talk about investing in AI, they often get caught up in the software layer. They look at a company like ServiceNow, a fantastic enterprise platform, and they track the `service now stock` as a barometer for the AI boom (ServiceNow tops estimates, approves 5-for-1 stock split). And that’s fine, but it’s like judging the entire Industrial Revolution by looking only at the companies that made the best factory uniforms. The real story is so much bigger, so much more fundamental.

The real story starts with a company most people have never heard of: ASML. This Dutch firm has a global monopoly on a technology called extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography. To put it simply—because the physics behind it is mind-bendingly complex—EUV machines use incredibly high-energy light to etch microscopic circuits onto silicon wafers. It's the only technology in the world that can create the impossibly small and powerful chips that modern AI demands. When I first grasped that a single company holds the key to the physical creation of every advanced AI chip on the planet, I honestly just sat back in my chair, speechless. Every single AI data center, every GPU that powers this revolution, owes its existence to a machine built by ASML.

This is the kind of breakthrough that reminds me why I got into this field in the first place. It’s the ultimate enabler.

And then you have the engine builders. Nvidia, of course, is the titan. They command over 90% of the data center GPU market, and their chips are the undisputed workhorses of the AI world. The demand for their next-generation Blackwell GPUs is so intense that it feels less like a product launch and more like the beginning of a new geological era—the Silicon Age giving way to the Intelligence Age. The speed of this is just staggering—it means the gap between what was science fiction yesterday and what is a commercial product tomorrow is closing faster than we can even comprehend, and it's all because of the raw computational power these teams are unlocking. Competing right alongside them is AMD, which is not just a secondary player but a vital force ensuring this market has the dynamism it needs to keep innovating.

What does it mean for our future when the very blueprints of progress are controlled by a handful of companies? This isn't a cynical question; it's a necessary one. The power to build the future comes with an immense responsibility to build it for everyone.

From Abstract Code to Physical Reality

This foundational layer of silicon and light is incredible, but it's what we build on top of it that will reshape our daily lives. This is where the abstract power of AI gets its hands dirty, moving from the data center into the physical world.

Take a look at a company like Symbotic. This isn't a household name, but its impact is everywhere. Symbotic builds AI-powered robotic systems for warehouses. Imagine a vast, complex ecosystem of robots, all coordinated by a central AI, moving, sorting, and packing goods with an efficiency that is simply not humanly possible. Walmart, the largest retailer in the country, is already using Symbotic's system in all 42 of its regional distribution centers. This isn't a far-off dream; this is the hidden engine that gets products to your doorstep faster and more reliably. It’s the physical manifestation of AI, turning chaotic supply chains into a finely tuned dance of automated precision.

And where does all this data live? Where does all this computation happen? It happens in the cloud, which is why Amazon is one of the most important AI companies on the planet. Forget the e-commerce side for a moment and just look at Amazon Web Services (AWS). AWS is the world’s largest cloud computing provider. It is, for all intents and purposes, the utility company for the digital age. It provides the servers, the storage, and the raw computational power that thousands of other companies rent to build their own AI applications.

Thinking of Amazon as just a shopping site is like thinking of Thomas Edison as just a guy who sold lightbulbs. The real innovation was the electrical grid he helped build. That’s what AWS is today. It’s the grid that will power the next century of innovation. When we look at the `now stock price` of these giants, we're not just seeing a number; we're seeing a measure of the market's faith in the infrastructure of tomorrow.

The Foundation is Being Poured

Let’s be clear. What we are witnessing is not just another tech cycle. This is a fundamental rewiring of our world. It’s a revolution built not on a single application or a flashy piece of software, but on a deep, powerful, and almost invisible foundation of specialized hardware and global-scale infrastructure. The companies laying this groundwork are not just market leaders; they are becoming as essential to our modern lives as steel, concrete, and electricity were to the 20th century. We are living through the quiet, monumental construction of our collective future, one chip, one server, and one robotic arm at a time. The blueprint is on the table, and the architects are hard at work.