Boris Cherny, head of Claude Code at Anthropic, said manual software engineering is dead during a developer conference in San Francisco this month.
The assertion signals a potential paradigm shift in how software is built, suggesting that human-written code is becoming a relic of the past.
Cherny said that at Anthropic, there is no manually written code anywhere. He said that Claude AI tools now autonomously write and coordinate code, removing the need for traditional manual processes [1, 2]. This shift toward autonomous generation allows the system to handle complex tasks without human intervention [1].
According to Cherny, this evolution will render traditional integrated development environments, such as VS Code and Xcode, obsolete in the near future [1, 2]. He said that the ability of AI to manage the entire coding lifecycle eliminates the requirement for the manual interfaces these tools provide [1].
The technical capabilities of the tool are significant. Claude Code can generate hundreds to thousands of lines of code from a single prompt [4]. This capacity allows for rapid iteration and deployment that exceeds the speed of human typing and manual architecture [4].
While the company focuses on the technical transition to AI-driven development, it is also pursuing massive financial expansion. Anthropic is planning a $10 billion fundraising round [5]. This capital injection would value the company at $350 billion [5].
The move toward autonomous coding is part of a broader trend of AI integration within the tech sector. Cherny's comments reflect a belief that the role of the software engineer is transitioning from a writer of code to a coordinator of AI systems [2, 3].
“At Anthropic, there is no manually written code anywhere.”
If Anthropic's internal transition to zero manual code is scalable, it suggests a future where the primary skill for developers is 'vibe coding' or high-level orchestration rather than syntax mastery. This would fundamentally disrupt the labor market for entry-level programmers and force a redesign of the entire software development toolchain.
