Atlassian shares jumped on Friday after the company reported a sharp increase in revenue, driven by growth in paid seats for its flagship Jira and Confluence products. The move challenged fears that artificial intelligence would shrink tech workforces and reduce demand for software.
For much of the past year, analysts and investors cautioned that rapid gains in developer productivity from AI could lead companies to hire fewer engineers and cut software subscriptions. Some also warned that AI coding tools might prompt enterprises to build more tools in-house instead of buying from established vendors.
Atlassian, whose software helps teams plan projects, collaborate, and build applications, sat squarely in the path of those concerns. The company’s stock had fallen more than 50% in the early months of 2026 as those worries took hold.
The latest results painted a different picture. Management said seat expansion across Jira and Confluence underpinned the revenue surge, and the stock rose about 35% on the day.
Atlassian shares jumped as AI broadens who builds software
The upbeat figures suggest AI is increasing the number of people engaged in software creation rather than displacing them. “There’s going to be more developers in the world in five years’ time than there are today,” Atlassian Chief Executive and cofounder Mike Cannon-Brookes said following the report, adding that developer hiring will keep climbing.
Cannon-Brookes said falling costs to build technology and rising demand for new tools are driving the trend. “The cost of building technology is going down. The amount of technology we’re going to build is going to go up,” he said, noting that customer signals point to substantial room for growth.
The dynamic echoes previous comments from Nvidia’s Jensen Huang, who argued that AI will make software creation far more accessible by allowing people to program using natural language. As he put it, the programming language becomes human, opening the door for many more would-be developers.
Atlassian reported that seat growth is not limited to software engineers. Roughly two-thirds of Jira and Confluence users now work in functions such as human resources, finance, and legal, according to the company. “The number of people building technology that we don’t necessarily call developers is also growing,” Cannon-Brookes said.
The shift suggests AI may be expanding the community of software builders across enterprises. If that continues, the anticipated collapse in software jobs and subscriptions may not materialize. Instead, AI could enlarge the overall market for collaboration and development tools, benefiting providers like Atlassian.