October 7, 2026
Building products is still hard: Linear CEO sees no breakthrough from AI
Karri Saarinen acknowledges that AI speeds up work but questions whether teams are building better products.
Linear CEO Karri Saarinen stopped keeping up with AI over the summer. He expected to feel left behind after the break, but that didn't happen.
Saarinen saw new models, techniques and AI agents. The tools let people do more, faster, but in his view, creating products, growing revenue and building a business remain difficult.
Saarinen suggests judging progress by products and how teams work rather than the tools they've mastered.
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