Agentic rebuilds are the new forking
Bill Doerrfeld | May 1, 2026
Cloudflare rebuilt Next.js over a weekend using agentic coding.
What does that say about the future of software strategy? The implications seem huge.
In my latest edition of DirectorPlus for LeadDev, interviewed Cloudflare CTO Dane Knecht to dig into what's really happening here, and why "starting from scratch" is becoming a far more viable option.
The results? Lower costs. Better performance. Fewer dependencies. More control.
Agentic rebuilds aren't just a one-off: they may represent the next evolution of open source forking.
As Knecht puts it, "This kind of reinvents the factory floor."
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