I believe there will be increased demand for in-house software engineering. Anecdotally, I’m seeing a trend where companies are revisiting the buy vs. build decision. They are slowly chipping away at expensive third-party SaaS solutions by building in-house applications. This allows them to build what the business needs instead of trying to modify SaaS solutions to fit their requirements. I believe AI will increase productivity but not replace engineering.
“Behind the scenes informal lines of communication between ICs often actually get the work done.” Well said — this has also been my experience on many “new opportunity projects.”