Replit’s CEO on building a company that can run itself

Amjad Masad, CEO of Replit, discusses the company's rapid growth and its ambition to become a "self-driving company". Replit, founded in 2016, started as a platform for beginners to run code in a browser without installation. It has since evolved to allow users to build, write, test, deploy, and host applications through AI agents. In March, Replit raised $400 million at a $9 billion valuation, up from $2.8 million in revenue in 2024. The company now boasts over 50 million users, including 85% of the Fortune 500.

Masad explains how Replit is implementing the "self-driving company" concept by deploying internal bots that serve as the "brain of the company" and canceling software contracts to replace vendors with internally built tools. He also mentions the company's expansion beyond coding tasks with the launch of Replit Design, an agent-based creative tool. Kimi K3, a model from Chinese lab Moonshot AI, is integrated into Replit Design and reportedly outperforms other models.

Masad acknowledges the mixed feelings surrounding AI's impact on work, stating that while there will be more jobs and companies, they will also result in more layoffs. He sympathizes with workers in their 50s who may struggle to retrain, attributing this burden to the government's lack of foresight. Lastly, Masad offers his perspective on Thomas Paul Mann's prediction that up to half of the software on your computer will be apps you make yourself within three years.

He suggests that agents will increasingly handle the apps for us, and the concept of apps may become obsolete as agents transact with each other on our behalf.