Zoho Vs Y Combinator: Vembu Counters Garry Tan On AI ‘Vibe Coding’ Claims — Here’s What Triggered The Exchange
“We will outshine and outlast his vibe coding companies!” Vembu said, responding to Y Combinator CEO Garry Tan.
A recent social media post by Y Combinator CEO Garry Tan about a possible disruption in the traditional SaaS (Software as a Service) industry due to AI-powered ‘vibe coding’ has triggered an intense debate about the future of software companies. The intense discussion took an interesting turn with Zoho CEO Sridhar Vembu countering Garry Tan’s big claims.
Posting on X, Garry Tan claimed that Zoho-like solutions “would be first to be competed away” by custom-built software created by non-expert teams leveraging Replit, Emergent Labs and Taskade.
“Zoho’s business would be first to be competed away by people building their own custom software built by people using Replit, Emergent Labs, and Taskade. Why pay $30/seat/month for over bundled SaaS when soon even nontech ops ppl can vibe-code a custom solution in a weekend?” Tan posted on X.
Vembu countered the claims, highlighting Zoho’s customer growth. He outlined that important tools, such as messaging apps, are not created via vibe coding.
“If our business would be the first to be competed away by vibe coded apps, why are we seeing such rapid customer growth (exceeding 50%) right now? And why don't we see vibe coded email, or spreadsheet, or accounting app, or messaging apps yet?” Vembu said.
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Vembu underlined how he looks at AI-powered software development.
“My own personal R&D project is to enable huge gains in programmer productivity by combining compiler technology with AI. Our goal is to enable a quantum leap in programmer productivity while being able to provide security, privacy and compliance guarantees. Without those guarantees, vibe coding just piles up tech debt faster and faster until the whole thing collapses.”
He then took a dig at Tan and threw down the gauntlet.
“Of course, for people like Garry Tan, tech debt is to be pawned off on unsuspecting acquirers. Let me make a bet with Garry Tan: we will outshine and outlast his vibe coding companies!” Vembu retorted.
Vibe coding has been at the centre of discussion in the tech world throughout 2025. Important figures like Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai have embraced it, saying that it has made coding much more enjoyable.
Because of its widespread use and adoption, Collins Dictionary named “vibe coding” its Word of the Year for 2025.
Vibe coding was first coined by OpenAI co-founder Andrej Karpathy in a post on X in February 2025.
Tan previously praised the advent of vibe coding in March 2025 during an interview with CNBC.
“You can just talk to the large language models and they will code entire apps,” he said.
“And if it doesn't do — if there's a bug, or if you want it to change, or you want it to look a different way, you don't have to, you know, go in there and write the code yourself,” Tan added.
