If anyone thought last year was going to be a one-and-done for Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA), they have surely been surprised by the chipmaker’s 78% gain in 2024. Artificial intelligence (AI) continues to be the driving force behind the chipmaker’s stock. But the technology is boosting the prospects of other companies too.

Further, AI is proving to be the defining application for Big Tech, offering practical, real-world use cases for business. Unlike some other technologies that were supposed to change how we interact, like the metaverse, AI is the real deal.  

Obviously, Nvidia tends to suck the oxygen out of the room when it comes to discussing AI opportunities. However, three more AI stocks to buy capture the tsunami of change the technology promises.

Amazon (AMZN)

Many understand that Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) is using AI to power its retail and cloud services businesses. Yet, they may not fully grasp the breadth of the tech company’s achievement.

Amazon views chatbots like OpenAI’s ChatGPT in how it develops and creates new business opportunities. It invested $4 billion into Anthropic, which is now using Amazon Web Services (AWS) as its primary cloud provider. But more importantly, Amazon has already built two AI chips of its own, Trainium and Inferentia. And few even realize that Amazon is now also a chipmaker. Anthropic, though, is using the chips to train its large language model (LLM) Claude.

Additionally, the online retailer has built its own AI platform, Bedrock. It allows others to build and scale generative AI applications with foundation models, or neural networks, that can adapt based upon inputs received.

Also, Amazon is investing $25 million in AI research in collaboration with Nvidia, the University of Washington and Japan’s University of Tsukuba. Amazon was late to the AI game but is quickly making up for lost time.

Alphabet (GOOG)(GOOGL)

Alphabet (NASDAQ:GOOG)(NASDAQ:GOOGL) is another tech giant that’s made waves in AI. Among other things, it developed its own generative AI chatbot Gemini which will be featured in Apple‘s (NASDAQ:AAPL) upcoming iPhone release. And, Google is developing an AI chip called Axion, even though it’s made its own computer chips for over a decade. However, it is not a feature of GOOG stock that is often highlighted.

Now that AI proves an important component for future growth, Alphabet is leaning hard into making AI chips like those used for data centers. Google wants to be less dependent on third party chipmakers like Nvidia because of the intense demand for limited chip resources. The search giant told The Wall Street Journal it doesn’t view Axion as competition for its current chip suppliers. Instead, it is “a basis for growing the size of the pie.”

Google has made AI-specific chips previously, called tensor processing units, for processes that are heavily reliant upon AI. For those chips it worked with Broadcom (NASDAQ:AVGO) to develop them. The Axion chip is built from Arm Holdings (NASDAQ:ARM) designs.

Look for this new wave of chipmaking outside of the traditional vendors to be a more common theme in the future.

Salesforce (CRM)

Rounding out our trio of alt-AI stocks is customer relationship management leader Salesforce (NYSE:CRM). It has quietly built up its activity and reputation in the space. Its generative AI platform Einstein GPT Copilot offers customers predictive analytics and personalized recommendations. 

Salesforce counts 17% of all Fortune 100 companies as clients with Einstein performing 1 trillion transactions a week for them. Yet, this is not an overnight development for the CRM stock. This is a platform nearly a decade in the making, going all the way back to 2016 when Salesforce paid $20 million to license the image of Albert Einstein. But today is when it starts to pay dividends.

Customers using Salesforce Unlimited Edition+ of the Einstein GPT Copilot are ramping up how much they spend with Salesforce. The company is seeing sales spike 50% or more in two-thirds of the industries it services. And, some have increased it as much as 70%.

Salesforce, as well as Amazon and Alphabet, is known in AI circles. Just how deeply integrated AI is becoming into their operations is not. It’s more than just adding features to products or performing numbers crunching for their business. It is literally transforming them and making them AI stocks to buy.

On the date of publication, Rich Duprey did not hold (either directly or indirectly) any positions in the securities mentioned in this article. The opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer, subject to the InvestorPlace.com Publishing Guidelines.