By @IBMResearch
Publication Date: 2026-06-04 12:45:00
It wasn’t that long ago that the state of the art in AI was generating you an image that sort of looked like the thing you’d asked for. In the interceding years, we’ve seen a Cambrian explosion of capabilities, with AI that can now generate flawless text, run mission-critical enterprise workflows, or orchestrate agents to run entire apps autonomously.
But even with all these advances, the ways we build and interact with AI models is quite different than any other piece of software. Enterprise users want their models to be as accurate and efficient as possible, but getting there is often out of reach for most developers. One reason is that up until now, it’s been incredibly difficult to break AI models down into the same kinds of plug-and-play building blocks we use for traditional software.
A modern software application is made up of smaller, self-contained pieces that work together, rather like an object composed of many LEGO bricks, instead of one giant block of clay. When…
