When I joined Snowplow last fall, it wasn’t in search of the next trend. It was in search of the fuel that could finally power the next generation of applications. 

After decades of building software aimed at reducing friction between users and outcomes, I’ve come to believe that the missing ingredient, the one we’ve always needed but never fully captured, is real-time behavioral context.

As a product leader, I’ve spent the past 30 years chasing this friction. I’ve seen how entire industries shift when new platforms allow us to reduce complexity, accelerate action, and bring more intelligence into every interaction. But I’ve also seen where the limits are, what even the best design and engineering teams can’t overcome without something more.

We are now entering a moment that offers that “something more”.

I’ve lived and worked through four major platform shifts. Each one reshaped not only what users experience but how we build:

1. Client-Server (Powersoft, early ’90s) I started my software career at Powersoft, where we pioneered 4GL (fourth-generation) application development tools  during the PC client-server revolution. This was a seismic shift. Developers no longer needed to work exclusively in mainframes. Suddenly, PCs could host rich UIs that connected to relational databases. This unlocked data in real time, not just through reports. What we offered wasn’t just faster development; it was empowerment. For the first time, business users could interact with data directly through applications tailored to their needs. That shift in accessibility launched an entire generation of enterprise software.

2. The Web (Allaire, late ’90s early 2000s) At Allaire, we made it possible to bring data-rich interactivity to the browser. ColdFusion let developers build dynamic, personalized web apps, years before “personalization” was a buzzword. I still remember acquiring one of the first companies in collaborative filtering to bring recommendations into reach for everyday developers. It was early. Maybe too early. But the idea was there: use data to shape each experience in real time. The friction we removed back then wasn’t just technical. It was creative. Developers could now think like designers and marketers. This was a major reason Allaire was acquired by Macromedia (Dreamweaver, Director, Flash). That fusion changed everything.

3. Mobile (Yahoo! 2008–2012) Then came mobile. The iPhone didn’t just bring a new screen. It redefined interaction. No keyboard. No mouse. Just gestures, sensors, immediacy. The friction now wasn’t about where you were, but what you could do in the moment. I saw companies scramble to rebuild around this new surface. Some succeeded. Many fell behind, including Yahoo!. We didn’t have the vocabulary for it then, but mobile was a transition to ambient computing. Context started to matter. Timing became everything.

4. Cloud + APIs (SaaS era, 2010s–2020s) The last decade was about composability: APIs, microservices, cloud-native architecture. The friction we removed here was infrastructural: scaling, deployment, integration. This enabled a wave of vertical SaaS, automation, and increasingly powerful customer experiences. But even with perfect data, beautiful design, and fast delivery, there was always one thing we couldn’t eliminate: The user still had to click. Still had to navigate. Still had to ask.

5. And Now, the Agentic Shift What’s emerging now—and what we’ve recently announced and what Snowplow Signals is built to support, is the fifth shift: agentic systems.

Agentic systems are software entities. They’re powered by real-time context and AI that act on behalf of users without waiting for explicit commands. 

It’s not a theory. It’s already happening.

Whether you call them AI agents, copilots, or digital concierges, they’re showing up in e-commerce, fintech, gaming, and healthcare. But here’s the deal: today’s agents are mostly senseless. They don’t know the user. They don’t know the moment. They wait to be told what to do.

They remind me of the early web. Flat, reactive, and disconnected. But just like then, the surface will mature rapidly. And this time, the stakes are even higher.

We’re no longer just redesigning interfaces. We’re rethinking agency.

In this new world:

• Applications won’t just respond. They’ll act.
• Journeys won’t be navigated. They’ll be orchestrated.
• Product design won’t be about buttons and components. It’ll be about interventions.

And just like with mobile or the web, product and engineering teams will need to retool. Fast.

The Opportunity and the Urgency

Back to Snowplow and the search for fuel. 

When I decided to join the company, it wasn’t just to continue to advance and innovate around our core data infrastructure. It was to go to the source of the thing that’s always been missing: context, and determine how we can use this as the fuel to ignite a whole new paradigm for applications. 

Snowplow Signals is how we do that. 

Snowplow Signals is a real-time customer intelligence system.  It gives AI applications instant access to both live user behavior and historical customer data to power personalized experiences.

In other words, it’s how agentic systems finally get their senses. 

Context is the difference between a chatbot and a concierge. It’s the reason why 95 percent of users who bounce from a site or app never convert. It’s what makes an AI agent helpful or hollow.

We’ve spent the last 13 years helping the world’s most data-driven organizations capture behavioral data with precision (aka the fuel). Now, with Signals, we’re giving them the means to inject that intelligence, real-time, session-level, predictive, personalized, into the very systems making decisions.

And this matters, because agentic systems are not just a better UX. They’re a new economic interface between brand and customer. 

Those who control the agent layer will control the customer relationship. Remember this.

Just like the travel industry ceded power to aggregators like Expedia, brands today risk losing ground to third-party AI platforms unless they build their own agentic experiences.

Looking Ahead

We are, once again, at the start of a shift that will reshape everything. But unlike past revolutions, the tools are still nascent. The patterns are still emerging.

That’s why I believe product and engineering leaders have a rare opportunity, not just to adopt this change, but to shape it.

You don’t need a fully formed agent to begin. You need a foundation:

• The right behavioral signals
• A flexible, composable, real-time infrastructure
• A clear mandate: remove friction, anticipate intent, and serve the user before they ask

That’s what Signals was built for.

If you’ve ever felt, like I have, that we’ve only scratched the surface of what personalization could be... If you’ve ever wished your product could act on insight rather than wait on clicks, now’s the moment.

We’re ready.

Let’s build what’s next.

Todd Boes
Chief Product Officer, Snowplow