By Dirk Pöhler, Software Engineering Manager
For years, artificial intelligence was something software engineers built into products to solve specific problems. Today, AI is helping software engineers build software itself.
Having worked with machine learning and AI-related technologies throughout my career, I’ve watched the field evolve from specialized applications into practical tools that support day-to-day work. What excites me most isn’t the hype surrounding AI. It’s the tangible impact we’re already seeing across software development.
Our engineering teams are using AI to accelerate design, coding, testing, debugging, documentation, and release preparation. By reducing time spent on routine tasks, AI allows engineers to focus more of their energy on solving complex problems and delivering value for customers.
A New Way of Building Software
Modern AI tools have become valuable development partners. When developing a new feature, engineers can use AI to explore implementation options, review existing code, generate test scenarios, identify potential issues, and create supporting documentation. Tasks that once required significant manual effort can now be completed much more efficiently.
The process remains highly collaborative. Engineers define the problem, provide direction, evaluate recommendations, and validate results against real-world requirements. AI can accelerate execution, but human expertise remains essential to ensuring quality and customer value.
Greater Productivity, Greater Impact
One of the biggest benefits of AI is productivity. Projects that once took weeks can often be completed in a matter of days. By reducing repetitive work, engineers can devote more time to problem-solving and product improvement.
The impact extends beyond efficiency. Faster development helps teams respond more quickly to opportunities and improve software quality, ultimately delivering stronger outcomes for customers. The goal isn’t automation for its own sake, but enabling people to create more value.
Connecting People, Knowledge, and Expertise
One of the most meaningful applications of AI has little to do with writing code. It has to do with helping people collaborate more effectively.
As a global company, we work across countries, time zones, and languages every day. Historically, language differences could create friction, even among highly skilled teams working toward the same objective. AI-powered translation tools are helping remove many of those barriers. I’ve seen communication improve significantly as these capabilities have become more widely available. Conversations are clearer and misunderstandings are reduced, as teams focus more on solving problems than overcoming language challenges.
This may not be the most visible application of AI, but it may be one of the most impactful. When people can communicate more effectively across regions and cultures, collaboration becomes stronger and expertise becomes easier to access.
Looking ahead, I believe AI can help unlock even greater value by making knowledge easier to find and share. Across the company, teams are solving similar challenges and developing valuable expertise every day. AI has the potential to connect employees with subject matter experts and best practices that already exist elsewhere in the organization.
By making that knowledge easier to discover, teams can build on existing work rather than starting from scratch, helping accelerate innovation and collaboration across the business.
I also see significant potential in customer support. Many customer questions already have answers within existing documentation and resources. AI-enabled support tools could help users find information more quickly while allowing technical experts to focus on the most complex challenges.
The Real Opportunity
Despite its capabilities, AI is not a substitute for experience or creativity. The most successful applications still depend on people who understand the problem and know how to guide the technology, who can determine whether the outcome truly meets the need. AI can accelerate the work, but expertise remains the foundation.
That’s why I’m optimistic about the future. AI is helping us develop software faster and communicate more effectively, while unlocking expertise across our global organization. The real opportunity isn’t the technology itself, but what becomes possible when people can share knowledge more freely and learn from one another, focusing their energy on solving meaningful challenges.
At its best, AI helps remove barriers, whether those barriers are repetitive tasks, language differences, or difficulty finding the right expertise. When we combine human ingenuity with the right tools, we don’t just work faster. We innovate more effectively and create greater value for customers.