Don't miss key shifts in business spend from Ramp Economics Lab.
January 6, 2026
What’s next for Ramp Economics Lab
I joined Ramp one year ago today. Since then, we:
- Developed and released Ramp AI Index, which has become the primary dataset used to track AI adoption among U.S. businesses and a go-to dataset for financial analysts tracking the impact of AI on our economy (find it on the Bloomberg Terminal).
- Have been cited by The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Economist, CNBC, Reuters, and CNBC, and built an audience on Substack that includes more than 1,700 subscribers from 43 states, 50 countries, executives from three of the top AI model companies, and most of the Silicon Valley VC ecosystem.
- Used our unique spend data to identify and highlight the fastest-growing software companies in the world — before they were noticed by institutional investors or the broader media scene.
I’m proud of this work and excited for the year ahead. In 2026, we will continue to build on the success of our key datasets, Ramp AI Index and Top SaaS vendors, while making the following new investments.
- More datasets tracking broad, macroeconomic trends. There is no public dataset that captures where and how American businesses spend. The most frequently cited datasets (like manufacturing activity or business sentiment) rely on surveys that can be unreliable and subject to the volatile swings of the human condition. Ramp data can fill the gap here. Business spend is a leading indicator. If it slows down and the U.S. economy is headed into a recession, Ramp data will catch it first.
- More datasets tracking the fastest-growing companies in tech and AI. And more transparency in how we generate our lists of trending software companies.
- I’ll be traveling more. I want to meet the founders, executives, and technologists who are at the forefront of building tools that help grow our economy by making businesses smarter and more productive. I’ll still be based in New York, but my first stop is Los Angeles. I’ll be there most of this month. Please write me if we should meet.
Thank you for following my work. More to come.
Want more exclusive insights on business spend? Get a copy of Ramp's latest Business Spending Report and follow me on X and LinkedIn.
Don't miss key shifts in business spend from Ramp Economics Lab.
Ara Kharazian•Economist, Ramp
Ara Kharazian is an economist at Ramp and writes the weekly newsletter Econ Lab on Substack. His writing and analysis of AI, business spend, and the economy has been covered in the New York Times, NBC News, ABC News, NPR's Planet Money, Bloomberg, the Guardian, Vox, Axios, and more. Ara previously led economic research at Square and was an economic consultant at Cornerstone Research.
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