Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff has once again sparked major debate in the tech world after revealing how aggressively the company is investing in artificial intelligence 🤖🔥.
Even though Salesforce stopped hiring software engineers in 2025, the company is now expected to spend nearly $300 million on AI-related services from Anthropic ⚡.
Benioff explained that AI coding agents and advanced AI models are dramatically changing how software engineers work.
Speaking on the All-In Podcast, he described modern AI coding systems as “awesome” and said they are helping Salesforce reduce development costs while increasing engineering speed 💻🚀.
According to Benioff, AI tools have already improved Salesforce engineering productivity by more than 30% 📈.
Back in 2024, the Salesforce CEO had announced that the company would stop adding more software engineers in 2025 because AI systems like Agentforce were already making engineering teams significantly more efficient.
“We’re not adding any more software engineers next year because we have increased productivity by more than 30%,” Benioff had said earlier.
However, he clarified that AI is not yet advanced enough to completely replace human engineers ⚠️.
Salesforce still employs around 15,000 engineers, but their roles are evolving rapidly.
Instead of writing every line manually, engineers are now increasingly supervising AI coding agents and collaborating with systems powered by:
- Anthropic Claude 🤖
- OpenAI Codex ⚡
- Cursor 💻
Benioff said engineers are becoming more like supervisors who guide AI systems rather than doing everything manually 👨💻➡️🤖.
“The model still cannot operate autonomously. We’re not at that level yet of AI,” he explained.
Interestingly, while Salesforce froze engineering hiring, the company continued hiring sales employees 🧑💼.
Benioff earlier revealed plans to recruit between 1,000 and 2,000 salespeople to help customers understand AI products and their business value 📊.
The company is also aggressively expanding AI across products like:
- Slack 💬
- Agentforce 🤖
- AI-powered enterprise tools ⚡
Reports suggest Salesforce has already invested over $300 million in Anthropic and holds a stake in the AI company 💰.
At the same time, Salesforce’s AI business “Agentforce” has reportedly reached around $800 million in annual recurring revenue 📈🔥.
Benioff described this shift as a “digital labour revolution,” claiming AI may already be handling 30% to 50% of Salesforce’s overall workload 🤯.
The announcement highlights how major tech companies are increasingly shifting investments from human hiring toward AI-powered automation systems ⚡.
Key Highlights ⚡
- ✅ Salesforce stops hiring engineers 🤖
- ✅ Marc Benioff expects $300M AI spending 💰
- ✅ AI boosted engineering productivity by 30% 📈
- ✅ Engineers now work alongside AI agents 💻
- ✅ Anthropic, OpenAI & Cursor used at Salesforce ⚡
- ✅ AI handles up to 50% of workload 🔥
