AI code editors are fundamentally changing the jobs of software engineers, but they won’t eliminate them completely, Thrive Capital investors say.
Philip Clark has witnessed the rise of vibe coding tools firsthand. In addition to Cursor, Thrive Capital has worked on the company’s investment in OpenAI, which debuted its Codex AI coding tool in May. Mr. Clark was promoted to partner in September.
Clark was optimistic about the future of engineering jobs in a recent interview on the podcast Sourcery.
“I invest in a lot of companies that use AI tools,” he said. “Especially on the coding and engineering side, I can’t imagine engineers being fired because of these tools.”
Clark said companies in his investment portfolio may be able to “grow without having to add as much headcount,” but no job cuts are occurring.
“Will there be some turnover in the economic centers?” he said. “Of course, it’s always been there. But in reality, it’s been much more of an enhancement technology than a replacement technology.”
There is still no substantive data on AI-related engineering savings. Hiring appears to be on the decline, with the number of software engineer job openings on Indeed recently at a five-year low. However, it is difficult to determine the exact cause.
Gen Z may be the most concerned about these AI tools. 62% of college seniors who know them well told Handshake that they are worried about their job prospects. Some Gen Z engineers face fewer entry-level job openings and less training to get started.
AI tools also have benefits such as increased productivity and new opportunities.
“It’s a really exciting way that anyone can actually become a 10x, or what we would call a 100x, engineer,” Clark says.
“100x Engineer” (i.e., an engineer who is already 10x more productive than the average engineer) is a new term in the technology industry. Edwin Chen, CEO of Surge, said the AI tools have created 100 times more engineers, which helped the company build a “billion-dollar one-person company.”
Clark remained optimistic that AI would replace menial tasks. He cited oncology, sustainable mining, and space settlements as areas of research that humans can pursue more meaningfully thanks to advances in AI.
“The benefit of AI is that it allows us to reallocate much of human brainpower, firepower, and creativity to these most important problems,” he said.
That brainpower can be diverted away from work that “doesn’t exploit the limits of human creativity and intellectual potential.”
