To demonstrate the power of AI in development, CEO Ariel Cohen tasked his co-founder with rebuilding their expense product over a weekend. Using AI tools, he accomplished the task in just six hours, signaling a dramatic shift in development cycles and the feasibility of rapidly rewriting complex applications.
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The development of Claude Cowork demonstrates a massive acceleration in product velocity. The entire application was written by its underlying AI agent, Claude Code, in just a week and a half. This showcases how AI-driven coding is collapsing development cycles for new software products.
Modern AI coding agents allow non-technical and technical users alike to rapidly translate business problems into functional software. This shift means the primary question is no longer 'What tool can I use?' but 'Can I build a custom solution for this right now?' This dramatically shortens the cycle from idea to execution for everyone.
Tim McLear used AI coding assistants to build custom apps for niche workflows, like partial document transcription and field research photo logging. He emphasizes that "no one was going to make me this app." The ability for non-specialists to quickly create such hyper-specific internal tools is a key, empowering benefit of AI-assisted development.
Capable AI coding assistants allow PMs to build and test functional prototypes or "skills" in a single day. This changes the product development philosophy, prioritizing quick validation with users over creating detailed UI mockups and specifications upfront.
AI tools like Vibe Coding remove the traditional dependency on design and engineering for prototyping. Product managers without coding expertise can now build and test functional prototypes with customers in hours, drastically accelerating problem-solution fit validation before committing development resources.
At OpenAI, the development cycle is accelerated by a practice called "vibe coding." Designers and PMs build functional prototypes directly with AI tools like Codex. This visual, interactive method is often faster and more effective for communicating ideas than writing traditional product specifications.
Traditionally, building software required deep knowledge of many complex layers and team handoffs. AI agents change this paradigm. A creator can now provide a vague idea and receive a 60-70% complete, working artifact, dramatically shortening the iteration cycle from months to minutes and bypassing initial complexities.
AI-assisted development, or "vibe coding," is re-engaging executives who coded earlier in their careers. It removes the time-consuming friction of going from idea to MVP, allowing them to quickly build personal tools and reconnect with the craft of software creation, even with demanding schedules.
Using AI platforms like Lovable, business leaders can build custom internal apps simply by describing what they want in plain English. The host created a bespoke org chart tool in 10 minutes, a process that previously required a lengthy and frustrating cycle with developers, showcasing a dramatic acceleration in productivity.
Cowork, a polished product from a major AI lab, was developed in just over a week using Claude Code itself. This is a major proof point that AI-assisted "vibe coding" is no longer just for prototypes but is a viable method for achieving extreme product velocity on production-grade software.