---
title: 2026-10-26 The shortest engineering path from ideas to products
tags:  #circleci  
author: [CircleCI Japan](https://image.docswell.com/user/circleci-japan)
site: [Docswell](https://www.docswell.com/)
thumbnail: https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/LE39QZR6E5.jpg?width=480
description: (文末に日本語あり) The shortest engineering path from ideas to products Speaker: Makoto Mizukami (Senior Field Engineer, CircleCI Japan)  Slides from the speaker session at the Antler Japan x CircleCI Meetup for Startups, held on October 26, 2026.  Turning an idea into a successful startup still comes down to four phases that AI hasn’t changed—Idea Verification, Customer Problem Fit, Problem Solution Fit, and Product Market Fit. This session focuses on the one phase AI has reshaped—building your MVP—and the two things that get in the way when you build with AI: keeping up forward speed, and fighting the “gravity backward” of regressions.  It brings together good-old engineering fundamentals (small, frequent tests; local validation; lightweight automation) and modern approaches with CircleCI and Chunk, to help you ship your MVP faster and more reliably.  Data sources (incl. CircleCI’s State of Software Development Report Q2 2026) are cited within the slides.   The shortest engineering path from ideas to products 登壇者:水上 誠(CircleCI Japan / シニア フィールド エンジニア)  2026年10月26日に開催された「Antler Japan x CircleCI Meetup for Startups」のスピーカーセッション資料です。  アイデアを「成功するスタートアップ」へと最短距離で育てるには、AI時代でも変わらない4つのフェーズ(Idea Verification / Customer Problem Fit / Problem Solution Fit / Product Market Fit)があります。本セッションでは、そのうちAIが大きく変えた「MVP実装」に焦点を当て、AIを使って開発を速く進めるうえで直面する2つの課題——前進のスピードと、品質の揺り戻し(regression)——にどう向き合うかを解説します。  「good-old」なエンジニアリングの基本(小さく頻繁なテスト、ローカル検証、自動化)と、CircleCI・Chunkによる最新のアプローチを組み合わせ、MVPを速く・確実に届けるための実践的なヒントをまとめています。  ※各種データは CircleCI「State of Software Development Report Q2 2026」ほか、スライド内に出典を記載しています。
published: October 30, 26
canonical: https://image.docswell.com/s/circleci-japan/KWRQ4Q-2026-10-30-114632
---
# Page. 1

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/LE39QZR6E5.jpg)

The shortest
engineering path
from ideas to products
Makoto Mizukami
Senior Field Engineer, CircleCI
1


# Page. 2

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/8EDG9RYMEG.jpg)

Hi there!
●
●
●
Makoto Mizukami
Senior Field Engineer @ CircleCI
Used to be a support engineer at Microsoft,
a full-stack hands-on engineer at a
legal-tech startup, and a people manager at
CircleCI and Degica / KOMOJU
2


# Page. 3

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/V7P3ZW6QJ8.jpg)

The shortest
engineering path
from ideas to products
Makoto Mizukami
Senior Field Engineer, CircleCI
3


# Page. 4

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/2JV4W83P7Q.jpg)

The shortest engineering path
from ideas
to a successful startup products
4


# Page. 5

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/5EG1D53QJL.jpg)

tl;dr
5


# Page. 6

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/4JQD1Z5W7P.jpg)

The golden path for startups - it’s nothing new
Four important phases to make ideas into a successful startup
Idea verification
Customer Problem Fit
Problem Solution Fit
Product Market Fit
Crystallize your idea to
the level that no one
can mimic, no one can
be more passionate
than you, and no one
can refuse to fall in
love with it eventually.
Interview possible
buyers, put yourself in
their shoes, and
thoroughly understand
their challenges and
pains.
Identify unique value
proposition, define
product customer
journey, and design
user experience.
Develop a product /
MVP that implements
your ideas, test your
hypotheses with the
product in the market,
and adjust your
direction.
6


# Page. 7

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/K74ZR391E1.jpg)

AI changed
only 1 phase
7


# Page. 8

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/LJ1RQ1K5JG.jpg)

The golden path for startups - it’s nothing new
Four important phases to make ideas into a successful startup
Idea verification
Customer Problem Fit
Problem Solution Fit
Product Market Fit
Crystallize your idea to
the level that no one
can mimic, no one can
be more passionate
than you, and no one
can refuse to fall in
love with it eventually.
Interview possible
buyers, put yourself in
their shoes, and
thoroughly understand
their challenges and
pains.
Identify unique value
proposition, define
product customer
journey, and design
user experience.
Develop a product /
MVP that implements
your ideas, test your
hypotheses with the
product in the market,
and adjust your
direction.
Itʼs YOU being
passionate about
crazy ideas. Not AI.
Itʼs YOU listening to
and representing
customers. Not AI.
Itʼs YOU tailoring
customer experience
emotion. Not AI.
It doesnʼt have to be
you to code MVP.
8


# Page. 9

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/GJW1M8DWE2.jpg)

CPF is yours.
PSF is yours.
CPF + PSF are your ideas.
Coding MVP is not.
9


# Page. 10

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/4EZPQ8G2J3.jpg)

So
concentrate on
your ideas
10


# Page. 11

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/Y76M6PQ6EV.jpg)

The shortest
engineering path
from ideas to products
Focusing on techniques to
implement MVP efficiently
Makoto Mizukami
Senior Field Engineer, CircleCI
11


# Page. 12

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/G75Z6KR5J4.jpg)

2 things
that will bother you while
implementing MVP with AI
12


# Page. 13

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/9J2RMWDG7R.jpg)

Speed of
forward progress
Code generation by violently-tireless AI
01
13


# Page. 14

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/DEYDXL2GEM.jpg)

AI enabled people
to code a lot
almost universally
14


# Page. 15

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/VJN61488J8.jpg)

… and generated a lot
of work that are just
piling up.
It isnʼt making yourself running faster necessarily.
15


# Page. 16

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/YE9L5QKX73.jpg)

16


# Page. 17

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/GE8XYGR9JD.jpg)

17


# Page. 18

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/LEL84GKM7R.jpg)

Source: DX, State of AI Impact in Engineering (data came from the report in Q2 2026
18


# Page. 19

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/4JM6KQ26EW.jpg)

Source: DX, State of AI Impact in Engineering (data came from the report in Q2 2026
19


# Page. 20

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/PJRPX8MNE9.jpg)

Actually some people
managed to
deliver more with AI
20


# Page. 21

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/PEX368V8JX.jpg)

Thereʼs a huge gap in day-to-day throughput
Source: CircleCI, State of Software Development Report Q2 2026 Pulse Report
21


# Page. 22

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/3EKY1KQLJD.jpg)

While many orgs are struggling, the winners are widening the gap
exponentially: p95 orgs are 9x faster on deliveries than the median
Source: CircleCI, State of Software Development Report Q2 2026 Pulse Report
22


# Page. 23

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/L739QZP675.jpg)

You need to deliver
MVP faster than the
“winners”.
You cannot leave stuff piling up.
23


# Page. 24

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/87DG9RLM7G.jpg)

Gravity backward
Regression, regression, regression!
02
24


# Page. 25

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/VJP3ZW2QE8.jpg)

MVP must reflect
your ideas consistently
25


# Page. 26

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/2EV4W8DPJQ.jpg)

But AI is good at
implementing something
different inconsistently
26


# Page. 27

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/57G1D5YQEL.jpg)

Hint of that tendency: AI code tends to fail to pass tests
Source: CircleCI, State of Software Development Report Q2 2026 Pulse Report
27


# Page. 28

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/4EQD1ZMWJP.jpg)

Then more back-and-forth was needed for corrections
Source: CircleCI, State of Software Development Report Q2 2026 Pulse Report
28


# Page. 29

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/KJ4ZR3V171.jpg)

Now we can understand why those people are spending a lot on AI
p99 spending 11x what p90 spends
p90 spending 54x what p50
spends
Spend is up 3x in both p99 and p90
cohorts in 2026
A lot of spend to move forward and
cancel the “gravity backwardˮ
Can you afford it? Do you want to?
29


# Page. 30

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/LE1RQ135EG.jpg)

> things that will bother you while coding MVP
01 Speed of forward progress
02 Gravity backward
How can you exploit the power of AI to move forward fast?
How can you avoid the spoilers that push you backward?
30


# Page. 31

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/GEW1M8PW72.jpg)

What should we be doing then?
31


# Page. 32

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/47ZPQ8K2E3.jpg)

This was actually what
the greatest engineers
were doing.
32


# Page. 33

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/YJ6M6P267V.jpg)

What is the key essence of “good-oldˮ practices?
●
●
●
●
Make a small investment in testing, and run tests small and repetitively
○
No need to be a fancy one, just a capability to run small tests (unlike time-consuming E2E tests)
Test code locally before committing changes
○
Deliver only what you know. Do not bother your team with garbage you donʼt know what it is.
Codify repetitive operations and automate it with minimal effort
○
At least “scriptizeˮ the testing procedure, building procedure, and deployment procedure
○
Then run tests, builds, and deployments automatically and autonomously
○
But never attempt to optimize the process / automation by yourself!
Be aware that vibe coding can go in the opposite way!
○
It can generate a lot of untested code, without granularity or verifications
○
It can generate a lot of code at once, not granularly
○
It can fail to generalize what it built, making it harder to repeat at minimal cost
33


# Page. 34

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/GJ5Z6K25E4.jpg)

Then it should look like this holistically
Change committed
Outer loop
System-managed)
Inner loop
Agent-driven)
Debug
Plan
AutoBuild
Release
Note: This Release step is what
your PMF experiment needs.
Validate
Local testing
Code
AutoDeploy
AutoValidate
Final
Approval
… then you want to run these loops as fast as possible!
34


# Page. 35

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/LE39QZK5E5.jpg)

The question is:
How can it be made fast
and effortlessly?
35


# Page. 36

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/8EDG9R3YEG.jpg)

With CircleCI, these are available as an instant package
Change committed
Outer loop
System-managed)
Inner loop
Agent-driven)
Plan
Debug
Build
Release
Fast
compute
Validate
Factory
CI/CD
Code
Deploy
Validate
Smart
Deployment
Chunk sidecar
Smarter
testing
Approval
Microbuild
36


# Page. 37

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/V7P3ZW42J8.jpg)

Chunk sidecars
●
●
●
Mechanics for “shift-leftˮ: run validations as early as possible - while coding
Coming with LLM configurations / skills, CLI, and microVMs mirroring CI environment
78 % faster than waiting for CI pipelines, 68 % cheaper than forcing agents to interact with CI
37


# Page. 38

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/2JV4W8XX7Q.jpg)

Smarter Testing - compilation of 4 features
NEW PAID FEATURES
Intelligent Test
Selection
Dynamic Test
Splitting
Auto-Rerun
Failed Tests
Test Analytics
Dashboard
Runs only tests
impacted by your code
changes via Test
Impact Analysis. 100%
confidence due to
deterministic test
selection.
Distributes tests
across parallel nodes
dynamically during
runtime using historical
timing data, eliminating
idle time and reducing
wall-clock test time.
Automatically retries
failed tests at the
individual test level
without re-running the
full suite.
Test health data, skip
rates, flaky trends,
time saved to better
understand your test
suite performance.
Coming Soon
Save time (and costs) up to 80 %
38


# Page. 39

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/5EG1D5VRJL.jpg)

Fast and efficient computation
●
●
Adjust resource allocation: less CPU cores for single-threaded tasks, more memory for intensed jobs
Modern “Gen2ˮ infrastructure - 40 % faster, 28 % cost saving
39


# Page. 40

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/4JQD1Z6Y7P.jpg)

Smart deployments
●
●
Make both build and deployment progress visible in one place - on CircleCI
Manage version promotions and rollbacks from CircleCI - both manually and even automatically
40


# Page. 41

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/K74ZR34ZE1.jpg)

The ultimate goal
The demo presented at the SF Tech Week Workshop
41


# Page. 42

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/LJ1RQ14DJG.jpg)

42


# Page. 43

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/GJW1M8X8E2.jpg)

Let’s reach PMF
wisely, and
as fast as possible.
By applying good-old best practices and cutting-edge approaches
43


# Page. 44

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/4EZPQ869J3.jpg)

Exclusive offer for startups!
●
●
●
CircleCI for Startups helps you start using Chunk sidecars and CircleCI overall
10,000 USD - up to 20,000 USD in free compute credits, for up to 24 months
Free access to paid support (a 249 USD/month value), and gated features like machines with GPUs
Visit
https://circleci.com/startup-program/ OR http://antler.getproven.com/vendor/circleci-3 OR https://startups.aws.com/offers
44


# Page. 45

![Page Image](https://bcdn.docswell.com/page/Y76M6P2DEV.jpg)

Thank
you.
45