Deep Read: The start-up that wants to become a start-up forge

Berlin, Düsseldorf. When Fabian Hedin presents his product at a conference for developers, that's a contradiction. Developers aren't his target audience at all. Hedin actually offers his AI coding platform to people who can't program. Nevertheless, he shows the audience on the stage of the We Are Developers conference in Berlin how the platform works.

"Let's build an app that allows the audience to ask me questions," he says into his laptop and thus directly to the AI agent he co-developed. And indeed, the finished app appears on the screen behind him - it looks like a chat window in a livestream - as well as a QR code that the audience can scan with their phone to submit questions.

Shortly thereafter, he answers the first written questions. Hardly any company stands for this type of software development with short voice commands as much as Lovable. So-called "vibe coding" made Lovable a European AI success story. The magazine "Forbes" described Lovable as the fastest-growing software start-up in history. Accordingly, co-founders Fabian Hedin and Anton Osika are in high demand worldwide.

The Handelsblatt has managed to have one of the rare conversations with Hedin. Because despite customers like the American ride-hailing service Uber, the pressure from US competition is growing. But Lovable wouldn't be Lovable if Osika and Hedin didn't already have a quick solution for this too.