The Real Threat to SaaS

Michael Bloch, on what cheap software building actually means:

When the cost of building software approaches zero, you don't get fewer software companies. You get 10x more. Every vertical that used to support three or four players can now support 30 or 40.

Everyone's been arguing about whether AI kills SaaS from the demand side — customers building their own tools instead of buying. Bloch spent 50 hours building a custom command center with Claude Code, uses it twice a day, saves 15 minutes. So: no.

But the supply side is where it gets uncomfortable. The moat for most software companies was never the product. It was the difficulty of building the product. That's not a moat. That's a construction delay.