The AI Native Dev - from Copilot today to AI Native Software Development tomorrow

Is AI actually intelligent — or just very fast at guessing based on bad data? 
Venkat Subramaniam, 40-year programming veteran, educator, and co-founder of Arc of AI, joins the AI Native Dev Podcast to share a perspective that cuts through the hype: AI stands for Accelerated Inference — not Artificial Intelligence. And that reframe changes everything about how developers should use it. 
In this episode, Venkat unpacks why the speed of AI generation has outpaced our ability to review it, why you can delegate work to AI but never your reputation, and tells the story of a $2 million feature that got cancelled with one simple question: "Why are we building this?" 
🔑 Topics covered: 
— Why "Accelerated Inference" is a more honest name for AI 
— The code quality crisis AI has inherited from decades of bad human code 
— Accountability, lawsuits, and professional responsibility in the AI era 
— What makes a senior developer 
— and why AI widens that gap 
— The one question that should precede every feature decision 
— Why vibe coding is the most overrated AI trend right now 
🎙️ Guest: Venkat Subramaniam — author, educator, and co-creator of Arc of AI 
🎙️ Host: Simon Maple 
📅 Recorded live at Arc of AI, Austin 
🔔 Subscribe for weekly conversations with practitioners (not vendors) building with AI. 
🎧 Listen on Spotify / Apple Podcasts — search "AI Native Dev" 
🌐 Community & events: tessl.io/community
Join the AI Native Dev Community on Discord: https://tessl.co/4ghikjh

Ask us questions: [email protected]

Rod Johnson — the creator of Spring Framework and founder of Embabel — joins Simon Maple on the AI Native Dev Podcast to share his unfiltered take on where enterprise AI is actually heading.

In this episode, Rod breaks down why enterprises are making a huge mistake rewriting Java apps in Python, why vibe coding will destroy your codebase if left unchecked, and why this might be the last generation of frameworks that developers ever choose for themselves.

Rod also pulls back the curtain on Embabel — the new JVM-native agentic framework he's building — including how it borrows its planning algorithm from NPC AI in video games, why he's skeptical of MCP despite its hype, and the AI failure pattern he keeps seeing in large enterprises.

Whether you're a Java developer navigating the AI wave or a tech lead trying to figure out where to actually invest, this is essential listening.

Topics covered:
0:00 Intro — Rod Johnson, Spring creator, returns to building
5:16 PhD in 19th century Parisian piano music (yes, really)
6:15 What made Rod come back and build Embabel
7:36 "The universe would end before Python could execute inference"
13:08 The #1 enterprise AI failure pattern Rod keeps seeing
16:23 "You cannot vibe code serious software"
19:37 Why Embabel uses a video game NPC planning algorithm
27:47 Why Rod is an MCP skeptic
53:54 "This is the last wave of frameworks chosen by people"

Links:
🔗 Embabel: https://embabel.com

🎟 AI Native Dev London (June 1–2): https://ainativedev.io — use code POD30 for 30% off.

Subscribe for weekly conversations with the engineers and founders building the future of AI-native development.
Join the AI Native Dev Community on Discord: https://tessl.co/4ghikjh

Ask us questions: [email protected]

How aligned are teams at Google DeepMind, OpenAI, Stripe, and ElevenLabs on what’s changing in software development?

At AI Engineer London, with 100+ speakers and 1000+ engineers in the room, Simon Maple pulls together perspectives from across the ecosystem to understand where AI-native development is heading.

• why traditional CI/CD “is dead”
• the growing need for automated code review and guardrails
• the move from more context is better to right context at the right time
• the difference between general-purpose models vs specialized domain models

To catch conversations like these in person, register for AI DevCon in London on 1st and 2nd June 2026.
Join the AI Native Dev Community on Discord: https://tessl.co/4ghikjh

Ask us questions: [email protected]

"If you could have a system that could build anything with code, humans can't compete on the same level. That's narrow superintelligence, and we're close."

In this episode of AI Native Dev, Simon Maple sits down with Logan Kilpatrick, who spent years at OpenAI working alongside Sam Altman before moving to Google DeepMind as Group Product Manager. 

They get into:
There will be 100x more developers in the world because of AI
AGI will be a product, not a model
The way you used AI tools three months ago is already wrong
What's actually changing inside the Gemini team and why it matters for developers building with it today

The developers who win won't be the ones who mastered today's tools. They'll be the ones who never stopped learning the new ones.

Building AI-native? AI DevCon is coming to London, 1st and 2nd June 2026: https://tessl.io/devcon/

Connect with us here:
Simon Maple: https://www.linkedin.com/in/simonmaple/
Logan Kilpatrick: https://www.linkedin.com/in/logankilpatrick/
Google DeepMind: https://www.linkedin.com/company/googledeepmind/
Tessl: https://www.linkedin.com/company/tesslio/?originalSubdomain=uk
Join the AI Native Dev Community on Discord: https://tessl.co/4ghikjh

Ask us questions: [email protected]

When did writing code stop being the job and start being the hobby?

One hundred episodes in, Guy Podjarny and Simon Maple pull the clips, check the predictions, and trace the through line across conversations with guests from Datadog, ElevenLabs, GitHub, and more.

They get into:
The move from spec-driven to context-driven development
Why humans become the bottleneck in code review
What changes when agents run the SDLC end-to-end
Adoption across orgs vs depth of actual usage

Thanks to every guest and every listener who made this possible. On to the next hundred.

Want to have these conversations in person? AI DevCon is coming to London on 1st and 2nd June, 2026.

Book your tickets here - https://tessl.io/devcon/

Connect with us here: 
Guy Podjarny- https://www.linkedin.com/in/guypo/
Simon Maple- https://www.linkedin.com/in/simonmaple/
Tessl- https://www.linkedin.com/company/tesslio/
AI Native Dev- https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/ai-native-dev/
Join the AI Native Dev Community on Discord: https://tessl.co/4ghikjh

Ask us questions: [email protected]