Ep 39: Github CEO Thomas Dohmke on Building Copilot, Scaling to 1.2M Users and the Future of Code

It was very special to have Github CEO Thomas Dhomke on the pod for many reasons, not the least of which is that my partner Erica Brescia was COO at Gitlab just before joining Redpoint! Thomas has been at Github for almost 6 years, and has been CEO for almost 3 of those years. He has a pulse on what engineers around the world are looking for from the world’s leading developer platform, and incredible vision and empathy in making Github delivers it.

[0:00] Intro

[1:08] The Magic of GitHub Copilot 

[2:07] AI's Impact on Software Development 

[2:49] Global Adoption and Democratization of AI 

[4:20] Keeping Developers in the Creative Flow 

[6:59] Future of Software Development with AI 

[9:54] Challenges and Opportunities in AI-Powered Coding 

[11:31] The Role of Agents in Copilot's Strategy 

[17:03] AI's Influence on Open Source Ecosystem 

[24:08] Fine-Tuning and Customization of Copilot 

[28:22] The Rapid Evolution of Copilot 

[30:26] Future Innovations and Accelerating Pace of AI 

[33:09] The Future of AI in Software Development 

[33:44] AI's Impact on Different Tech Stacks 

[34:21] The Evolution of Media Consumption 

[35:15] The Competitive Landscape of AI Models 

[37:02] The Infinite Game of Business 

[38:17] The Role of Multiple AI Models in Enterprises 

[43:01] Advice for Founders Competing with Incumbents 

[45:06] The Importance of Focus in Startups 

[45:50] Expanding the GitHub Ecosystem with Extensions 

[47:20] The Next Wave of Copilot 

[50:57] Quick Fire Questions 

[54:35] Erica and Jordan Debrief

With your co-hosts: 

@jacobeffron 

- Partner at Redpoint, Former PM Flatiron Health 

@patrickachase 

- Partner at Redpoint, Former ML Engineer LinkedIn 

@ericabrescia 

- Former COO Github, Founder Bitnami (acq’d by VMWare) 

@jordan_segall 

- Partner at Redpoint

Jacob is an AI investor at Redpoint Ventures. He's led Redpoint's investments in companies like Abridge, Physical Intelligence & Legora. Follow Jacob on Twitter (@jacobeffron).

On Unsupervised Learning we probe the sharpest minds in AI in search for the truth about what's real today, what will be real in the future and what it all means for businesses and the world. If you're a builder, researcher or investor navigating the AI world, this podcast will help you deconstruct and understand the most important breakthroughs and see a clearer picture of reality. Subscribe to this show to stay up to date on our latest episodes.