Event Archive

"That’s probably where [SaaS applications] all collapse, right in the agent era,” said Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella in an interview with the BG2 Pod podcast in late-2024, predicting that AI agents will replace Software-as-a-Service (SaaS). Just over a year later, the markets have reflected some of his sentiment.

At the centre of these views is AI models' ability to write software code, represented by AI coding agents that design and run elaborate coding projects, and vibe coding where users direct an AI model with prompts to create more basic applications. Each can undermine many SaaS businesses. The increasing use of these tools led to a dramatic week in February 2026, when investors sold off over $1tn in software stocks. The media were soon calling it the “SaaS apocalypse”, courtesy of trading floor wonks who first saw the sell-off. Is this the death-knell of SaaS? No, but the SaaS market is undergoing a shakeup, and companies that rely on SaaS software should take note.