Sridhar Vembu: AI era demands domain expertise beyond coding
Zoho founder Sridhar Vembu thinks tech pros need more than just coding chops in the AI era.
He points out that while programming matters, companies really value people who understand things like security, reliability, and compliance: areas where human know-how still makes a big difference.
As he puts it, "Programming skills are the foundation (and we definitely don't want to lose them) but deep domain knowledge is what customers pay for, along with reliability, security, support and compliance."
Zoho avoided layoffs, peers cut jobs
Vembu also shared that AI can help speed up early stages of building products, but most of the hard work still needs real people.
His advice: focus on making customer experiences better instead of just writing code faster.
Unlike big players like Meta and Amazon, who have cut jobs as they adopt more AI, Zoho has not laid anyone off, showing they believe human skills are still essential alongside new tech.