Rudraprasad DasNo crash. No headlines.
Just systems shifting beneath our feet.
Something unusual is happening in tech. And most people can’t quite name it. Layoffs are still trickling in. Tools are improving faster than teams can keep up. Roles are shifting, merging, or quietly dissolving. Founders are pivoting, but not by choice. And even high performers are asking questions they’ve never had to ask before:
“AI fixed the bug in two lines. I was still thinking.”“Agent made the workflow. I just clicked approve.”
“First AI draft… wasn’t bad. That’s what scared me.”
This isn’t just a vibe shift. It’s structural. Subtle, quiet, and accelerating fast.
I call it The Silent Disruption.
What’s actually happening?
Let’s start with what I know.
Not speculation. Not theory. Just the facts.
In just the first half of 2025, nearly 94,000 tech workers have been laid off. And no, it’s not because the market is down. It’s because AI is changing the work itself.
Let me break it down:
- Microsoft saved over $500 million in one year by automating workflows with AI.
- Over 15,000 roles were cut in the process.
- About 30% of its code is now written by GitHub Copilot.
- Sources: Reuters
- Salesforce claims 30–50% of its internal tasks are now handled by AI.
- CEO Marc Benioff said it out loud: “The AI workforce is here.”
- Sources: Inc.com
- In just Q1 of 2025, over 62,000 tech jobs were cut across 284 companies.
- That includes big names: Google, Intel, Meta.
- Sources: FinalRoundAI
And the overall count? 94,000 layoffs. In six months. In tech alone.
But here’s the thing I’ve realized: the real shift isn’t in the numbers. It’s in what the numbers don’t show. Something deeper is going on, and if you’ve been in tech a while, you can feel it.
Why This One Feels Different
Compared to past technology shifts like the rise of mobile, cloud, or SaaS, this one feels different. Those waves created fresh demand and brought people along. New roles emerged, often faster than old ones disappeared.
But the AI transition unfolding now feels more subtractive than additive in its current form. It’s not just changing how work is done; it’s changing what work is considered essential. And unlike past shifts, the tools aren’t creating new categories of value at scale. Not yet. They’re inheriting work that humans used to own. Quietly. Without friction.
New roles are emerging - prompt engineers, AI operations specialists, orchestration architects. But so far, they remain limited in number and concentrated in specific segments of the industry. Meanwhile, role reductions are happening across a much broader base.
This mismatch in scale reflects a deeper shift in how organizations are redesigning their operations. AI isn’t being layered on top of existing teams; it’s being embedded in ways that reduce the need for certain roles altogether.
You Can Feel It, Even If No One Says It
I feel it. My peers do too. Even the ones who say they don’t, are starting to.
Across roles, the ground is shifting:
- 👨💻 Engineers watch AI scaffold entire codebases and write docs.
- 📋 PMs rely on agents to draft specs and prioritize tasks.
- 🎨 Designers see plugins generate production-ready layouts.
- 🧪 QA & Support teams shrink as triage bots scale.
- 🚀 Founders feel the pressure to go AI-native, or get left behind.
But it’s not just about jobs.
It’s one of those quiet drifts that makes you feel, “Where do I still fit?”
And the unsettling part?
No one’s really talking about it.
Even Tech Is Folding Inward
The industry that once thrived on openness is folding into itself. It is quietly redrawing where innovation happens, and who gets to shape it.
- Open source is slowing down.
- AI talent is clustering inside Big Tech.
- Infra costs are centralizing innovation.
- Terms of use are rewriting what can be built.
Fewer maintainers. Fewer experiments. Weekend projects now feel gated by legal reviews and unclear licenses.
The brightest minds are moving where the compute, data, and salaries live. Not because they want to stay closed. But because the infrastructure forces it.
Training or fine-tuning modern models isn’t just technical. It’s expensive. The bar to enter is no longer curiosity; it’s capital.
License restrictions, API limitations, and closed ecosystems now shape the boundaries of innovation.
And This Goes Way Beyond Tech
What we’re seeing now, the layoffs, the quiet dissolving of roles, the silent handover to machines, isn’t just a tech story. It’s starting here because tech moves first. Fastest to build, fastest to break, fastest to adapt.
But it doesn’t stop here.
The drift is already spreading beyond code, beyond product, beyond the Silicon Valley job boards. And the pattern’s the same:
The work stays. The worker fades.
And if I’m being honest, that’s not surprising. That’s just how most modern work is built: structured, repeatable, easy to delegate… or automate.
How We Move Forward
Let’s be clear.
I’m not trying to cause panic. I’m just shining a light on what no one’s saying out loud.
If you’re in tech, don’t just keep up with AI. Learn to see with it. Think in systems. Frame better questions.
Build the glue, not just the parts.
If you’re outside tech, don’t assume this won’t reach you. It already has.
Start listening. Start adapting. Not later; now.
If you’re building, stretch what’s possible. But don’t forget what’s precious.
Efficiency matters; but not at the cost of care, creativity, or conscience.
And, if you’ve read this far and felt something shift, you’re not alone. I’ve felt it too. But at some point, the choice becomes clear:
Look forward. Not backward.
Why We Wrote This
The Ingenuity Co. was never just about tools.
It’s about protecting something deeper. The human side of progress.
This isn’t a manifesto. It’s a pulse check.
If it made you pause, even for a moment, good. That’s the point.
We’ll keep listening.
We’ll keep writing.
We’ll keep building; Especially when it’s quiet.