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Bain tests software takeover targets by vibecoding AI replicas
https://archive.is/6BUJw https://archive.is/6BUJw
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- mmarian 3mo agoHard to see it'll help them much. There's so many other aspects to a successful software business vs just ease of build.
- alistairSH 3mo agoCustomer already pay management consultancies for software - certainly BAH does a bunch of that here in DC (some .gov, some private sector).
- alephnerd 3mo ago> management consultancies for software... Management/Strategy Consulting is different from Implementation Consulting (eg. BAH building and operating a .gov site).
- alistairSH 3mo agoSure, and Bain, like BAH, has a software consulting practice. Many of the big consultancies do.
- alephnerd 3mo agoMy point is, if you are going to use terminology then use terminology correctly. The signal to noise ratio on HN is already bad enough as it is. Implementation Consulting is always a separate practice under a seprate set of partners and leadership from Strategy Consulting. Also, BAH doesn't really do Management Consulting anymore. What Bain is doing is basically testing whether the valuation of acquisition targets actually makes sense or not, which is different from what you are talking about.
- jameslk 3mo agoThat's the point of why they're doing it. From TFA: "Private equity investors are turning to AI-generated replicas of software to assess whether acquisition targets have a competitive advantage [...] 'We are leveraging vibecoding to show what a software company can and can’t do, to understand where it fits in the value chain and to understand whether it is the actual code that is the defensible part of the business or something else,'"
- rich_sasha 3mo agoIs the future of software really vibe coded by management consultants..?
- dgellow 3mo agoit's not, no, but some groups will try. Paying for corporate software is mostly about delegating responsibility
- alistairSH 3mo agoBasic CRUD apps? Sure, why not. Anything substantially new will still require an engineer in the loop. Specifically, if a new design pattern, archtecture, etc is required. AI can only build on its training material - it can't yet have original thoughts.
- rich_sasha 3mo agoI can still think of many reasons why not.
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- budsniffer952 3mo ago>AI can only build on its training material - it can't yet have original thoughts. Oh, so it's only good for 99.9999% of all software? And people will say things like, "it's limited by training data" without any mention of just how VAST that data is. While you're here, can you give us some "original thoughts" to demonstrate your ability over Claude?
- danesparza 3mo agoSoftware consulting has been around for a very long time. Decades. It has always been overpriced and had huge margins. I think what management consultants are really afraid of is being replaced. By AI.
- RugnirViking 3mo agothe ease of making a prototype is not at all related to the ease of productising/releasing/bringing to market and that, in turn, is not at all related to the ease of maintenence/maturization/scaling. You didn't even want the same kind of guy or team doing each one before ai. Turns out, AI is great at prototyping, ok at productizing and terrible at maintenence and scaling
- alephnerd 3mo agoThe point about prototyping and vibecoding in this manner is to wargame and think about workflows and whether or not they are defensible. A product where the secret sauce is basically a distribution play is going to need a different strategy and demand a different valuation compared to a product where the platform itself is successfully monetizing on a workflow.
- mmarian 3mo agoWhat would vibecoding reveal that analysis wouldn't though?
- peder 3mo agoI mean, this is just basic smart investing today. Software is now very easily replicable, and you wouldn't want to invest in software that has absolutely no moat. At a minimum, this gives Bain more leverage when negotiating with these companies.
- claytongulick 3mo ago> Software is now very easily replicable How? Do you mean by AI? I haven't seen any evidence of this. It was always possible to get code generated at large volumes for low cost (offshore/outsource market) but we didn't see this upend or replace many (if any) software companies. In my experience it had the opposite effect - companies that replaced talented internal teams ended up suffering. LLM generated code is similar, but arguably more expensive and lower quality. We don't see LLM generated product replacement at scale because code generation is a problem, but it's not the only problem. Low quality can kill a product, but high quality doesn't guarantee success. There's an entire ecosystem around a successful software offering. An ecosystem that depends on adequately functioning code. LLMs may be useful for certain tasks (...maybe... - we've always had good options for repetitive code generation) but I certainly wouldn't describe it as "very easily replicable".
- budsniffer952 3mo agoImagine saying with a straight face "we've always had code generation tools like LLMs".
- claytongulick 3mo agoYes, we have, though that wasn't my point - I was comparing LLMs to offshore development. But since you bring it up, those of us that have been around a while have used many code generation tools that took care of tedious work like model creation, forms, validation, class creation, CRUD, component creation, project skeletons, starter templates, visual design tools that generate code, etc... etc... basically most of the stuff that LLMs are good at. Simple things that are tedious and don't require much thought - the sorts of things that statistical pattern matchers like LLMs are good at. The rest of it, the stuff that requires thoughtful architecture and reasoning is where LLMs fall flat and mostly end up costing time. The research supports this. So yep, my face is indeed quite straight.
- su8898 3mo agoIf only Bain could use their AI skills to fix their website. It's a horrible and convoluted mess!
- Jensson 3mo agoHow would the AI fix fix that?
- VladVladikoff 3mo agoWell he did say “if only”
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- xnx 3mo agoVery good idea. For every company that is valuable because of software + knowledge + service + loyal customers there are a dozen that only exist because of weak competition and inertia. Easy to imagine there are a lot of software products that could be cloned and out-competed by taking 15% profit margin instead of 50%.
- hackingonempty 3mo agoThis is like saying Twitter isn't worth much because every web framework tutorial produces a "Twitter clone."
- Thrymr 3mo agoWell, Twitter isn't worth much, or at least not what Elon paid for it in 2022, it just carries on like a zombie under a different name and investors got bailed out by being rolled into xAI and then the SpaceX IPO. Though your point that Twitter's value was never in the code stands.
- deleted 3mo ago[deleted]
- citizenpaul 3mo agoIDK. The internet is full of examples of platform max exodus's. This may actually be a killer idea that will finally challenge the tech oligarchy power. I think we are in for a turbulent future. The FANNG/MANGO companies have essentially never had any real challenge to their dominace. We are about to enter an era where they will be challenged for the first time. I don't think they will be nice about it and we will see their true non altruistic colors. Especially Google and Apple which have lost their halos but are still considered "good actors" by many.
- paul7986 3mo agoI CALL FOR ANTIARCHY AGAINST AI! ALL PROGRAMMERS and VIBE CODERS use AI against itself ... vibe code systems that forces AI to pay all of humans for our content! Without our content AI is irrelevant! Why are we giving our content/souls to it freely now so it thrives and we do not??
- jujube3 3mo agoSir, this is a Wendy's.
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- xg15 3mo agoSomewhat fitting that we just got the Backrooms movie which is about making Uncanny Valley copies of locations (and people) and here we have Uncanny Valley copies of software...
- etchalon 3mo agoThis seems incredibly logical if the application is claiming its IP has value without accounts/revenue that justify that value.
- codelong888 3mo ago[flagged]
- ibrobaba 3mo ago[flagged]