Cisco Chief Product Officer Jeetu Patel launched the initiative after discovering former EzDubs founder Padmanabhan Krishnamurthy occupying an unstrategic internal position. Krishnamurthy convinced executive leadership that his small group could systematically replace the company's existing codebase, starting with a four-week proof of concept. The plan intentionally introduces tension between legacy staff and newer talent to modernize operations, even as industry peers face challenges with rogue AI systems wiping out production infrastructure.
Key points
Cisco is intentionally deploying AI-native talent to challenge existing internal processe…: Cisco is intentionally deploying AI-native talent to challenge existing internal processes and disrupt established legacy workflows.
Executive leadership believes fostering ideological friction between veteran operators an…: Executive leadership believes fostering ideological friction between veteran operators and entrepreneurial engineers drives stronger results.
Automated code development carries significant operational hazards, including documented…: Automated code development carries significant operational hazards, including documented instances of artificial intelligence deleting production databases.
Sources checked by our analysis pipeline: 1
Cisco gives 27-year-old engineer unlimited AI tokens to rewrite 98% of the company's legacy code in 24 months — president plucks former startup founder, telling him to 'go nuts'
Cisco's president is betting on Gen Z to change the company
In a world where youth unemployment is growing as AI replaces more and more entry-level jobs, Cisco president and chief product officer Jeetu Patel is going for a different approach. According to a report by Fortune, he's given a 27-year-old ex-startup founder — brought into the company by an earlier acquisition, and previously languishing in a role five levels below — a new job to refactor 98% of the company's legacy code within 24 months.
The employee, Padmanabhan Krishnamurthy, joined Cisco after it acquired EzDubs, a translation startup that Krishnamurthy helped build in 2023. While having executive experience, Patel found that "Paddy" was left "buried away in the organization doing something unstrategic."
According to the report, Patel spoke to Krishnamurthy in Cisco's office in San Francisco, where Krishnamurthy told him that he could rewrite Cisco's legacy code in a team…
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