YC General Partner Tom Blomfield explains how to move beyond the traditional hierarchical company structure and build a self-improving organization using AI. He introduces the concept of recursive, self-improving AI loops that can optimize a company's operations, products, and knowledge base while the founders sleep.
YC General Partner Tom Blomfield explains how to move beyond the 'copilot' mindset and restructure companies as series of recursive, self-improving AI loops. He details how to make company knowledge legible to AI, creating systems that improve overnight with minimal human intervention, ultimately rendering traditional middle management obsolete.
Thibault Sottiaux, Head of Codex at OpenAI, discusses the evolution of Codex from a niche developer tool into a general-purpose agent for knowledge work. He explores how this shift is redefining productivity, team dynamics, and our fundamental relationship with technology.
Boris Cherny, creator of Claude Code, discusses the future of software development at AI Ascent 2026. He argues that coding is effectively a solved problem, detailing his personal workflow of shipping dozens of PRs daily from his phone. Cherny explores the shift from typeahead to autonomous agents, the rise of cross-disciplinary generalist teams, and uses the printing press as an analogy for the coming democratization of software creation for all.
Swyx, co-founder of the AI Engineer conference, reveals how his "tiny team" of nine people leverages AI agents like Cognition's Devin and Town Assistant to manage a multi-million dollar business and organize large-scale events. He shares practical examples of how agents have transformed their workflow, from converting Figma designs to pixel-perfect websites to managing complex conference schedules and even performing personal research tasks, arguing for a future focused on "Agent Experience" (AX).
Greg Brockman, co-founder and president of OpenAI, discusses the company's insatiable need for compute, the state of scaling laws, and the belief that we are 80% of the way to AGI. He explores how agentic coding tools are transforming software development, the emerging role of human attention as the ultimate bottleneck, and the future of AI in pushing scientific frontiers.