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Secret CPO | Software Failures Are Making Headlines—Don’t Be Next

Plus: Empower any team to build AI agents—no coding needed.

Welcome to Secret CPO, your go-to source for expert insights, strategies, and trends to elevate your product leadership game—helping you stay ahead.

CPO Briefing 💼

PRODUCT MANAGEMENT

Product managers must now integrate AI into both workflow optimisation and user-facing product features, developing hands-on expertise to drive immediate impact. Utilising AI enables advanced customer data analysis, enhances experimentation, and supports rapid iteration. Adapting to this shift is critical for maintaining product relevance and achieving market leadership.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE DEVELOPMENTS

Notable AI advancements this week include enterprise-focused agentic platforms from Accenture, IBM, and ConductorOne, enhanced observability solutions, and expanded AI-native analytics capabilities across sectors. Strategic acquisitions—such as Palo Alto Networks acquiring Protect AI and Pythian acquiring Rittman Mead—signal intensified competition in talent and product capabilities. CPOs should monitor these shifts for direct implications on product roadmap agility, data governance, and technology differentiation in eCommerce and enterprise solutions.

Industry Insights 🔎

SOFTWARE RISK MANAGEMENT

High-profile software failures—from Citibank’s $87 trillion transfer error to the Post Office’s Horizon scandal and $800 million Southwest Airlines loss—demonstrate the operational, financial, and reputational risks of neglected user experience. Rigorous UX validation and system updating are critical for CPOs seeking sustainable product success.

AI INTEGRATION STRATEGY

Aaron Kesler, Director of AI Product Management at SnapLogic, discusses the enterprise impact of AI-powered integration platforms that empower both technical and non-technical teams to rapidly build custom AI agents with no coding required. SnapLogic’s tools facilitate secure, scalable workflow automation and cross-departmental efficiencies, meeting real-world demands such as IT support ticket reduction and benefits management. For CPOs, this highlights the necessity of targeted AI upskilling, robust governance, and leveraging customer feedback for measurable adoption and productivity gains.

SOCIAL MEDIA STRATEGY

Facebook’s phased approach to driving Reels production addressed cold start, organic production, and ROI challenges by leveraging cross-posting, creator incentives, and advanced creator tools. Quality and adoption surged through data-driven segmentation, platform-native support, and gamification. The initiative demonstrates robust product management with over 140 million Reels now produced.

PRODUCT ANALYTICS EXPANSION

Datadog’s acquisition of Eppo integrates feature flagging and experimentation directly within its SaaS platform, providing unified analytics, real-time impact measurement, and safe deployment pathways for AI products. This enables CPOs to quantify and optimise user engagement, cost trade-offs, and business outcomes with considerably reduced operational risk.

AI ENGINEERING REVOLUTION

Devin, an autonomous AI software engineer by Cognition, now handles 25% of the company’s pull requests and is expected to contribute 50% by year-end, integrating seamlessly into development tools such as Slack, Linear, and GitHub. This development significantly shifts engineers' roles from manual code implementation to higher-level architectural design, demonstrating product-driven efficiency gains. AI engineering adoption necessitates a cultural adjustment to maximise team productivity and competitiveness in software delivery.

CPO’s Calendar 🗓️

📆 13-15 May 2025
📍 SF Bay Area, USA

The 11th SaaStr Annual brings together over 10,000 Cloud, SaaS, and AI founders, VCs, and senior executives for three days of high-impact, tactical content. With hundreds of hands-on workshops and thousands of curated networking sessions, the event focuses on reducing friction in the scale-up journey. For product leaders, it's a chance to gain actionable insights from top operators, align product vision with go-to-market strategy, and forge connections that fuel long-term success in an increasingly competitive SaaS landscape.

Feedback Corner 💭

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