Rodrigo Coutinho is the co-founder and AI product manager of Outsystems. Since co-founding the company in 2001, he has especially been decisively involved in the design and vision of the product, especially its architecture and visual language. From day one, he focused on developing innovative and pragmatic ways to speed up enterprise applications delivery. Now he reduces this goal by using AI to increase productivity on orders of magnitude.
Outsystems is a low-code platform powered by generative AI that helps organizations quickly build, manage and grow enterprise-level applications. It can develop mission-critical software faster, encourage collaboration between IT and business teams, and support scalable cloud build structures – the entire software lifecycle while reducing backlogs.
How does AI change the low-code development landscape?
New AI tools bring two major transformations to low code: productivity and communication methods. Generated AI is helping low-code developers build applications faster and higher quality speeds. Training models using architectural best practices to ensure that the advice given to developers is justified. In addition, the generated AI is used for other parts of the life cycle, such as application design, application verification, and staging, which accelerates the rate from idea to application.
The second major transformation is the result of the first, and the exchange between IT and business will undergo tremendous changes. With the ability to use AI and bass code to create the first version of an application in minutes and can change dramatically in seconds, the application can be done with the business. It can show the actual running application in real time, rather than communicating through the requirements document.
This will change its role, bring developers to the table and enable innovation to stimulate from the combination of business and technology.
What are the main advantages of AI-driven low-code development compared to traditional coding methods?
Unlike traditional codes that are powered by AI, low-code platforms powered by AI, such as Outsystems mentors, overcome key challenges such as siloed code, poor code quality, lack of transparency and explanatory nature. This is possible because low-coding tools such as Outsystems use advanced models to abstract the complexity of the code, making the generated application feasible to ensure it is effective and to follow best practices.
What challenges do organizations face when implementing AI-driven low-code platforms?
There are a few things that organizations need to be aware of when selecting and implementing these low-code powered platforms. First, look for a platform that uses AI to enhance the entire SDLC, not just code generation. Second, consider how the tool can help change the way we work. For example, using mentors, Undsystems aims to change the relationship between IT and business, which will have a more profound impact on the organization than just increasing the productivity of developers.
Finally, staying compatible is a challenge for organizations using AI-powered low-code platforms. The developer team must remember not to speed up reviews for compliance red flags or potential security vulnerabilities and always involve the legal team, especially when working with clients or sensitive data. That’s why Outsystems has adapted this to provide a framework that automatically ensures data governance and regulatory compliance.
What distinguishes Outsystems from other low-code development platforms?
Outsystems aims to provide the best developer experience with the most complex AI and the most complex AI toolset in the low-code market. The Outsystems platform addresses AI-driven development with AI tools to address unparalleled speed and scale to address security vulnerabilities, technical debt and other maintenance issues. Our automated AI Agent Builder allows IT teams to easily build Genai-fusion applications with advanced Genai expertise.
Outsystems is also an LCAP platform that can be used in any use case, providing unparalleled performance and scale, and can support even the most unpredictable and inconsistent traffic. When you build on an external system, you will build these applications and will always be yours, and easily integrate with other technologies and existing infrastructure, without the limitations of walls or features.
How can AI help enterprises solve the “buy and build” dilemma in software development?
AI and low-coding platforms are making customized software more accessible, cost-effective and adaptable, providing businesses with new opportunities to build their own platforms at a fraction of the traditional cost. Additionally, an AI-powered low-code development platform allows you to build a technology stack faster with fewer resources.
The reality is that AI is shifting the balance of power here – companies that had previously had to invest in expensive customizations in off-the-shelf software, often sacrificing control and visibility for economic reasons, now have access to new ways to build software that is specifically for them.
What is Outsystems mentor and how does it leverage AI to automate the complete software development lifecycle (SDLC)?
Outsystems Mentor is the industry’s first complete software development lifecycle (SDLC) digital worker that enables application generation, delivery, and monitoring, all powered by low code and Genai. The mentor introduces a true “bias” approach to application creation, allowing developers to start in the process. Starting with discovery and rapid prototyping, IT teams can validate ideas and refine the initial design before full development. Users simply describe the application or vision they need, while the instructor generates an initial version with front-end features, data models, and embedded business logic. By automating application prototyping and ensuring top-notch code quality, the instructor redefined SDLC.
What is different from other AI-driven low-code development tools?
The mentor transforms the software development and management workflow into the main competitive differentiator. Using AI-driven application generation, optimization, automated quality checks, and under centralized management, mentors improve developer productivity while ensuring applications meet the highest quality standards. Additionally, the mentor can do this at a speed previously deemed impossible, allowing the team to do more in time and adjust as needed.
Unlike traditional AI code, tutors overcome key challenges such as siloed code, poor code quality, and lack of transparency and explanatory nature. It ensures that teams remain in control, reduce technical debt, and fully utilize the potential of AI-powered software development, making it a smarter and more efficient option for modern fast application development.
Through design, mentors can meet all data governance requirements and standards to ensure compliance and security. Its model-driven development can be easier to maintain by focusing on the model rather than the code, ultimately allowing developers to focus on the project at hand.
How does the tutor’s AI-driven approach improve governance and security compared to traditional Genai tools?
With mentors, teams can verify and maintain applications through AI-driven code reviews to ensure all applications meet the highest standards of development, security, performance, architecture, and long-term maintainability. By implementing these comments from the start, developers can maintain data governance and visibility at every step of the process.
The instructor can also proactively and regularly check for issues with possible compromises on the quality or safety of the application in a production environment. All key aspects of these applications, such as architecture, security, performance, and maintenance, can be closely monitored and inspected throughout the development cycle for the best coding practices and quality. At Outsystems, we are critical to the importance of enterprise security and recognize the importance of maintaining the application universe built by our platform and customers, ultimately enabling our customers to build secure applications, leveraging Outverystems technology and cloud-based services without the need for in-depth security technologies.
How does the tutor’s AI architecture coordinate multiple agents to accelerate application development?
Mentor is a digital worker: a non-human, AI-driven team member who trains to complete or support sequential tasks and even the entire process. It combines generated AI cues, natural language processing, leading AI models and machine learning to automate tedious, distinct and complex processes and enhance human work.
Mentor utilizes multiple agents, each specializing in specific aspects of application development, rapidly generating fully functional applications by collaborating simultaneously across different parts of the project, greatly reducing development time, while reducing quality by leveraging the advantages of each agent in the software development process.
How does Outsystems plan to develop its AI capabilities in the next few years?
At Outsystems, our AI strategy focuses on using AI and machine learning to accelerate iterative application development, improve security, performance, and agility, and build Genai-driven applications to accelerate transformation. As we scale our product offerings through Mentor and our AI Agent Builder, we will continue to leverage Genai and Agesic AI to enable IT teams to innovate without limits.
Thanks for your excellent interview, readers who wish to learn more should visit Outsystems.
