“Yeah, yeah, yeah, merging some code every once in a while. Technically, like a lot of code is getting written for me to do all sorts of kinds of like analysis, like, you know, understand like trends, understand the business, understand the next feature, you know, how well our previous launches are doing. A lot of code is written by Codex for that. You know, I'm obviously not writing it by hand anymore.”
Thibault Sottiaux, Head of Codex. Leads the team that builds the product he describes, so he speaks from inside it; OpenAI sells Codex.
OpenAI sells AI or agent tools or services, so it has a reason to publish flattering numbers about AI. The passage stays in the archive; read it with that in mind.
How this was checked
Not yet checked by an independent second reader. The wording, speaker and date come from the source linked above; treat it as a lead until it is confirmed.
Two whisper passes of the original audio agree on every content word quoted: pass 1 is a full-audio transcription, pass 2 a separate re-cut clip with 5 seconds of margin (the prepared 3:45 whisper file, a third pass, also covers this one and agrees). Spoken filler ('you know', 'like') that either pass heard is kept, because whisper tends to drop filler; every other disagreement is marked with …. Normalization: punctuation, and the spelling of product and company names the passes heard as sound-alikes ('codecs'/'Codex Fordot' heard for 'Codex'; the sentence after 'by hand anymore' is left out). OpenAI sells ChatGPT, Codex and Dots. Second reader (2026-11-08): dispute. Reviewer saw: Whisper text near 01:56 matches word for word, except it renders the product name as 'codecs': 'A lot of code is written by codecs for that.' The passage says 'Codex'. No captions.md exists for this video, so I cannot show the passage matches one transcript exactly. Almost certainly a whisper mishearing, but under the rules it is a dispute. Other differences are punctuation only (e.g. 'feature. You know how well').
How to cite this passage
Thibault Sottiaux (OpenAI), “OpenAI's Head of ChatGPT: We're entering a new era of AI (again)”, Lenny's Podcast (YouTube), 2026-10-04, at 01:56. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MM-C3JqCXBk Archived at https://the-ai-record.com/passages/openai-codex-writes-analysis-code-for-me-2026
Context. Asked for a recent AI use case that impressed him, Sottiaux describes his personal Dots agent warning him of a production outage shortly before the OpenAI DevDay live demo.