Months-old startup Cognition AI has emerged from stealth mode with Devin, a generative platform it is calling “the world’s first fully autonomous AI software engineer.” Although Cognition has yet to make Devin widely available, much less allow independent testing, if its claims are true it would mark a turning point in the AI coding space, moving it from a field of AI assistants to a full-fledged AI engineer. Based on natural language instruction, Devin could potentially take a project from concept to execution rather than simply suggesting code snippets or offering barebones frameworks.

Cognition says in a blog post that Devin can “plan and execute complex engineering tasks requiring thousands of decisions” and can even learn to fix its own mistakes, which would position it to compete with top code engines such as GitHub Copilot, developed by Microsoft and OpenAI.

“Devin is said to stand out from the crowd with its ability to handle entire development projects end-to-end, right from writing the code and fixing the bugs associated with it to final execution,” VentureBeat reports, agreeing with Cognition that it is the “first offering of this kind,” which has already demonstrated it can handle coding projects listed on Upwork.

Devin “can autonomously create code for entire engineering jobs, including its own AI models,” according to SiliconANGLE. It accomplishes tasks by undertaking Internet searches for educational material it then ingests to learn how to complete its assignment. It can debug problems it encounters along the way, though human intervention is possible at any stage of the process.

“We’ve given Devin the ability to actively collaborate with the user,” Cognition CEO Scott Wu writes in the blog post. “Devin reports on its progress in real time, accepts feedback, and works together with you through design choices as needed.”

The post includes a video that shows Devin in action, including how its command line and code editor work, providing an overview of what to expect from its workflow and how it tackles data research and complex coding tasks.

Bloomberg, one of the few outlets to get a hands-on look at Devin, says Devin “does appear to be well ahead of the other coding assistants in many respects,” and goes into the background of the 10-person team, saying it has many “sport-coders,” who have won gold medals at high-level international coding competitions.

Cognition investors include Peter Thiel’s Founders Fund, former Twitter VP Elad Gil and DoorDash CEO Tony Xu.