Many within the software sector, and the QA space in particular, have said that it is close to inevitable that some jobs will be cut or become redundant as artificial intelligence is accelerating automation processes, with automated testing being rolled out across the industry.
While some QA insiders have warned recently that AI-powered solutions are not as accurate yet as human software testers, practically every firm and QA team is rapidly integrating AI-driven tools.
In fact, numerous research reports published in recent months predict that AI-driven testing tools will be integrated by 80% of banks, financial services firms and other companies in the next few years.
This has led to fears that QA teams may become smaller, as some human testers, engineers and developers become redundant.
However, fear not is the message from a leading industry insider.
Tal Barmeir, co-founder of AI-powered software testing firm BlinqIO, who recently spoke at the QA Financial Forum London, sees AI transforming the role of human testers into “AI-assisted testers,” where AI merely boosts their productivity and efficiency.
But AI replacing humans altogether? No, Barmeir is convinced that will not happen as she stated that the fear of AI replacing testers simply overlooks its collaborative potential to boost, rather than replace, their capabilities.
“While AI integration in software testing is increasing, I think it is unlikely to replace human testers completely,” Barmeir said.
“AI-augmented tools excel at handling repetitive, data-intensive tasks, which can free up human testers to focus on more complex testing scenarios that require critical thinking and decision-making skills,” she reportedly said.
Barmeir added that “by integrating AI tools, testers can automate mundane aspects of the testing process, allowing them to handle more tests in less time and with greater accuracy.”
In addition, she stressed that “this shift not only speeds up the development cycle but also allows testers to focus on areas requiring deeper insight, such as user experience and security.”
Despite Barmeir being in big believer in the potential of AI, she said “humans will remain essential in software testing because they understand context, interpret nuanced user behaviors, and make ethical decisions. AI is adept at analyzing data and identifying patterns but cannot understand context or make value-driven decisions, areas where human judgment is crucial.”
BlinqIO recently launched its first-ever AI test recorder, which the software tester claims can be just as productive as a human tester, thereby helping firms to deal with the current shortage of testing professionals.
The launch means the latest headline-grabbing undertaking for the rapidly growing Israeli-American generative artificial intelligence software testing firm.
AI Test Recorder, which is primarily aimed at the financial services industry, should help banks and other related firms to speed dup their software development cycles.
At the same time, the solution is designed to decrease the level of arduous tasks for software testers, the firm stressed.
BlinqIO’s new AI Test Recorder is able to perform equivalent work to that of a human test automation engineer, the company claimed, receiving a test requirement and delivering a test suite in Playwright, the widely-used tool that simplifies the process of test automation and enabling code generation.
“With most software testing cycles taking between three to six weeks, companies are turning to AI to speed up processes and complement existing teams,” Barmeir added, singling out a number of recent reports that found that 54% of developers are turning to DevOps for faster development cycles.
“Humans play a critical role in monitoring and interpreting results.”
– Tal Barmeir
Nevertheless, “humans play a critical role in monitoring and interpreting results, ensuring testing aligns with ethical standards and business objectives, and providing the contextual understanding that AI currently cannot achieve on its own.”
The AI test recorder complements BlinqIO’s existing AI test engineer which understands requirements, makes decisions, creates test automation code, and maintains it autonomously against UI changes, according to the American-Israeli firm.
Speaking about the launch, Barmeir said she believes that the firm’s new AI test recorder “will transform software testing globally.”
She explained that “our AI test recorder enables non-technical testers to carry out test scenarios without writing any code and receive the full-blown Playwright code project in return. This democratises the process of test automation, enabling teams to implement automation faster and more effectively.”
Moreover, Barmeir said that “it also enables companies to decrease time-to-market. Through its capabilities, we hope more organisations will embrace the power of AI and innovation within the software testing ecosystem.”
The new AI solution is part of a much wider transformation within the QA space, Barmeir argued, as she said more and more firms are embracing AI at an unprecedented speed. Automation seems to be the buzzword at the moment.
“This shift toward automation is significantly shortening the time to market [TTM] for new software releases, which is a critical advantage in today’s fast-paced digital landscape,” she said.
Investor vote of confidence
The launch of the AI Test Recorder came only two months after BlinqIO received millions in fresh funding as the firm secured $4.8 million from two major tech investors.
Flint Capital, together with an investment vehicle run by Inovia Capital, the Precede Fund 1, agreed in June to give the Delaware-headquartered AI company a capital injection to help the BlinqIO to expand its AI test automation engineering platform.
Barmeir said there is a healthy demand for BlinqIO’s automated software testing solution as it claims to help financial services firms to run better tests faster, and more frequently.
“BlinqIO removes the test automation bottleneck and providing immediate feedback to developers which enables lightspeed time to market for new software products,” Barmeir shared.
BlinqIO’s first AI testing platform, which launched just over a year ago, has been making waves within the industry in the last 12 months through its AI-powered large language model which is able to read and integrate different requirements for and from various other tests. It is also capable of taking decisions independently, about which tests to run and when.
Moreover, Barmeir stressed that her tool has been designed to develop test automation codes by itself, and is able to do so in over 40 languages.
Barmeir and Guy Arieli previously co-founded Experitest, a SaaS mobile testing platform that was successfully acquired by TPG in 2022.
Rapid expansion
BlinqIO looks back on twelve months of immense growth and expansion after it launched, in 2023, its BlinqIO Virtual Tester, an autonomous testing platform for websites and applications that is used by many large banks, insurance firms and other big players in the financial services space.
The solution enables the launch of human-like virtual software testers which are operated by generative AI, saving banks and others time and money.
At the end of last year, Barmeir and Arieli announced a significant investment from a consortium of notable investors. Although the exact amount was not disclosed, allocations did include personal investments by several SoftBank executives.
Barmeir and Arieli, following their Experitest sale, are now driving to further disrupt the testing industry with BlinqIO. Prior to founding BlinqIO and Experitest, Barmeir held various leadership positions in Accenture and Comverse.
The firm’s SaaS-based mediation platform leverages the power of Generative AI in the testing world.
“The platform acts like a virtual software tester: its decision-making brains are artificial intelligence, and we provide it eyes to ‘see’ the website or application it is testing and ‘hands’ to control the digital interface and interact with it to perform the test,” Barmeir explained in an interview with QA Financial earlier this year.
“Essentially, the virtual tester receives a test scenario description in plain English, analyses it, and then assesses the digital website or app it needs to test against.”
She added: “It then uses the power of AI to make decisions on how to perform the required test on the target website or app. Decisions such as how to navigate, what a shopping cart is, how to add an item, and other necessary decisions for performing the test.”
Once it manages to perform the test, it creates test automation code on the fly for future executions, running then from the code it created initially, without any AI.
It reverts back to the AI only if something changes in the UI and the test needs to be adjusted. In these cases, it will autonomously correct the test.
“Large incumbents looking to use AI never actually build it from scratch the right way.”
– Tal Barmeir
Despite the market being increasingly crowded and competitive, BlinqIO believes it is able to compete and stand out through its AI-first approach.
“The product was designed from its inception as an AI product. This means we collect data, structure its storage, and know how to send it to the right algorithms to make use of it for the AI engine,” Barmeir explained.
“Large incumbents looking to use AI in their existing products will face the issue of patching an existing product, but never actually build it from scratch the right way.”
Barmeir called this “a big advantage” as she pointed out that BlinqIO has approached this trend with “a fresh perspective yet building on our past knowledge of the industry and its needs.”
Despite the rapid growth, risks and challenges remain, however, something Barmeir acknowledged.
“I think a main challenge, as always with new technologies, is the fear that it will harm the market and the people working in it,” she said.
Barmeir thinks that “like any technological advancement, it is a productivity booster, and history has proven again and again that if embraced, the value of people using it increases rather than decreases.”
“But I think this misconception is a challenge any AI-based offering has in today’s reality,” she noted.
Calling AI “truly groundbreaking” Barmeir concluded by saying that “it’s once in a hundred years that such a major change surfaces in the technology world, and the possibilities are endless. I can see many opportunities to grow both in autonomous testing and also in adjacent domains, both along the value chain of testing as well as in new domains such as documentation and user experience.”
NEXT MONTH IN SINGAPORE
REGISTRATION IS NOW OPEN FOR THE QA FINANCIAL FORUM SINGAPORE 2024
Test automation, data and software risk management in the era of AI
The QA Financial Forum launches in Singapore on November 6th, 2024, at the Tanglin club.
An invited audience of DevOps, testing and quality engineering leaders from financial firms will hear presentations from expert speakers.
Delegate places are free for employees of banks, insurance companies, capital market firms and trading venues.
QA FINANCIAL FORUM LONDON: RECAP
Last month, on September 11, QA Financial held the London conference of the QA Financial Forum, a global series of conference and networking meetings for software risk managers.
The agenda was designed to meet the needs of software testers working for banks and other financial firms working in regulated, complex markets.
Please check our special post-conference flipbook by clicking here.
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