Zoho's Sridhar Vembu To Software Engineers: 'High Salary Not Birthright'

Zoho founder Sridhar Vembu has issued a warning for software engineers, saying that the era of consistently higher salaries for tech roles may not last forever. In a recent X post, Mr Vembu warned that software engineers’ high pay is not some birthright and cannot be taken for granted. He emphasised the importance of not assuming that customers will always be willing to pay for software products, urging tech professionals to remain vigilant about their value proposition. He also stated that software engineers can be “disrupted” given the productivity revolution coming to the field. 

“I have often said this to our employees: the fact that software engineers get paid better than mechanical engineers or civil engineers or chemists or school teachers is not some birthright and we cannot take that for granted, and we cannot assume it will last forever. The fact that customers pay for our products also cannot be taken for granted,” Mr Vembu said.  

I have often said this to our employees: the fact that software engineers get paid better than mechanical engineers or civil engineers or chemists or school teachers is not some birthright and we cannot take that for granted, and we cannot assume it will last forever.

The fact…

— Sridhar Vembu (@svembu) May 18, 2025

The Zoho founder stated that software engineers need to remind themselves that they are likely to be disrupted. “This is to remind ourselves that we can be ‘disrupted’ – and the more we assume we won’t be, the more likely we will be. Or as Andy Grove of Intel said, ‘Only the paranoid survive’,” he said.

Concluding his post, Mr Vembu said that his advice is “necessary to internalise”. “The productivity revolution I see coming to software development (LLMs + tooling) could destroy a lot of software jobs. This is sobering but necessary to internalise,” he wrote. 

Internet users were quick to react to Mr Vembu’s post. While many users agreed with the Zoho founder, others said that factors like artificial intelligence (AI) will “flip” the current setup. 

“AI along with de-dollarization will flip the script. I think we are at the edge of this shift. Software devs, bankers, and consultants got fat paychecks from all the easy money. As that fades, civil, mechanical, and materials engineers, those building real stuff, will rise,” one user wrote. 

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“Well elucidated. Salary levels of s/w engineers are questioned now. The more critical thing is shrinking job opportunities for s/w engineers. Youngsters aspiring to get into the profession and lay off of current employees!” commented another. 

“Agree! Software engineers has to come out of the mindset that software development is hard/intelligent process that no one can do it. Because it’s no more valid. AI can do it better than humans (at least now in few areas),” said a third user. 

“I don’t think jobs will disappear, they’ll just pay a lot less, so the bloating in IT industry will reduce gradually,” wrote another.