‘AI may slow us down’: Sridhar Vembu says programmers failing reviews are ‘not doing their job’

Zoho founder Sridhar Vembu has offered a candid snapshot of his AI usage as of August 2025, calling the technology a powerful learning and debate tool but cautioning against over-reliance for customer interactions or unreviewed code generation.

In a detailed X post, Vembu revealed he uses AI chat tools “daily, at least 2-3 sessions a day,” describing himself as a moderate to heavy user. He has the top five AI apps installed on his phone and uses them all.

The biggest change, he said, is in how he searches for information. “My web search has gone down 80% as a direct result,” he noted, praising AI’s role in helping him learn faster. Vembu also values AI as a “very good debating partner,” often feeding one AI’s output into another for critique to deepen his understanding.

However, his endorsement comes with strong caveats. While AI can enhance product experiences—citing X’s Grok as an example—he rejects the idea of letting AI create new content for customers without disclosure. “It is unwise for a human to copy paste AI text and send to a customer, hiding the fact that it came from AI,” Vembu warned.

On coding, his stance is even firmer. AI-generated code, he stressed, requires thorough compliance, privacy, and security reviews—work that is “neither easy nor fun” and can erase productivity gains. “If any programmer submits AI generated code without doing all this, they are failing at their job,” he said, adding that in some cases, AI may even slow development down.

Vembu encourages Zoho’s programmers to use AI primarily for learning and debate, not for unchecked content creation or code delivery. He concluded by noting Zoho is “running a lot of experiments” and that his views may evolve as “facts change on the ground.”