OpenAI looked at buying Cursor creator before turning to Windsurf

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

Deal size, valuation, and founder outcomes

  • Commenters speculate wildly on price: rumors around $3B; others imagine $20B and debate whether OpenAI could even fund that in cash.
  • OpenAI’s $40B SoftBank round is noted as conditional and possibly only partly realized, raising doubts about its ability to pay large all‑cash sums.
  • Cursor is said to be valued at ~100x revenue; several see this as bubble territory, especially given heavy inference costs for “agentic” products.
  • Rough cap-table math: at a ~$3B exit post‑Series C, founders might personally clear hundreds of millions, especially if they already took secondaries.

“Agentic Software Engineer” claims and reality

  • The CFO’s pitch that an “A‑SWE” can build apps end‑to‑end (PRs, QA, docs) is widely viewed as hype or outright vaporware.
  • Skeptics point out OpenAI is still aggressively hiring engineers; if A‑SWE could truly replace SWE work, they’d dogfood it and publicize that.
  • Developers report that tools like Cursor/Claude Code are great helpers but unreliable on non‑trivial tasks, with compounding errors and no real causal understanding.
  • Some see them as the CAD of software engineering: hard to imagine working without them, but far from a replacement for expertise.

Can AI keep improving without human programmers?

  • Debate centers on whether AI can “keep coding” once it largely replaces human coders.
  • One side argues RL + tool use (compile/run/test) can create a self‑improvement loop, even from existing “recipe books” of code.
  • Others stress missing human judgment and goal alignment: AI can generate novel combinations, but not decide what’s useful to humans or discover entirely new paradigms.
  • Concerns about training on AI‑generated output (ouroboros problem) and the long‑term quality of knowledge.

IDE data as a flywheel vs. developers training their replacements

  • Several argue OpenAI’s investments in Cursor/Windsurf are about capturing real‑world coding interaction data to drive RL and automation.
  • Others question how much developers will tolerate their editor analytics being used to build tools meant to replace them; some foresee many doing it anyway due to incentives or employer pressure.
  • A “prisoner’s dilemma” narrative appears: teams that avoid AI risk losing to those that embrace it, even if everyone suspects it erodes job security.

Strategic logic (or irrational bubble?) of buying wrapper IDEs

  • Some see this as classic vertical integration: like breweries buying pubs, OpenAI would secure distribution and make its models the “default” in popular IDEs.
  • Comparisons are drawn to Facebook buying Instagram/WhatsApp and to default search engine deals in browsers.
  • Others think paying billions for VS Code forks with prompt UIs and no proprietary models is irrational “Yahoo 2.0” behavior and a sign OpenAI may be hitting architectural limits instead of achieving AGI.
  • There’s skepticism about OpenAI spreading into too many fronts (IDE tools, possible social media, etc.) and losing focus on core models.

Lock‑in, choice, and user reactions

  • Some users say they’ll cancel if OpenAI acquires Windsurf; others would welcome Windsurf bundled into ChatGPT Plus.
  • A key concern: whether an acquired IDE would still support Anthropic, Google, DeepSeek, etc., or become OpenAI‑only. Many currently use Cursor/Windsurf precisely to mix models.

Competition and alternatives

  • Commenters note strong open‑source or cheaper setups: Cline + DeepSeek, Aider + OpenRouter, Gemini 2.5 Pro in custom flows, Claude Code, and VS Code’s own new Agent mode.
  • Microsoft is seen as having the endgame power via VS Code; Google’s Firebase Studio / idx is mentioned as a potential 800‑pound gorilla if they double down.
  • JetBrains’ Junie and Windsurf-on‑JetBrains are noted but seen as less polished than Cursor today.

Developer experience and sentiment

  • Many enjoy the “magic” of agents wandering a codebase and acting like a very smart junior dev, increasing joy and enabling doc‑driven or exploratory workflows.
  • At the same time, there’s a dark undercurrent: people marvel at the tools while worrying that the “cute junior dev” may grow into their replacement.
  • Some see embracing these tools as pragmatic self‑preservation (learn to operate the machines); others call developer enthusiasm for their potential replacement “really, really dumb.”