Uploaded May 2026 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
*Featured in this video:* Ashvin Kamaraju, Global VP, Engineering and Cloud Operations, and Alain Michaud, Engineering CTO, Thales Cyber Security Products
*Executive summary:* Thales, an advanced security and digital identity provider, is on a mission to build a future that’s based on trust. To counter rapidly evolving threats, Thales Cybersecurity Products division adopted an AI-forward approach using Gemini Code Assist and Gemini CLI. By integrating Gemini into CI/CD pipelines and the full software development lifecycle, Thales is eliminating the technical debt and engineering toil, allowing developers to focus on building more secure products at unprecedented speeds.
*Challenge:* Cybersecurity threats change almost daily. Thales engineers needed to innovate faster to mitigate these emerging threats, but they were often slowed down by significant technical debt and mundane tasks. This meant that traditional development timelines for complex security features could span anywhere from months to over a year. Beyond speed, the toil of repetitive coding tasks led to frequent context switching, which impacted both developer satisfaction and the overall efficiency of the engineering organization.
*Solution:* Thales expanded its long-standing relationship with Google by deploying Gemini Code Assist and Gemini CLI across its cybersecurity business line. The team focused on an AI-first software development lifecycle, where AI takes on the repetitive, low-value scaffolding work, freeing engineers to move higher up the value chain and apply the creativity and engineering judgment that truly delivers value to customers. A key differentiator for Thales was the extensibility of Gemini CLI, which allowed engineering teams to plug the tool directly into their specific workflows and custom CI/CD pipelines. This integration aims to shrink the entire development cycle, from ideation through deployment, ensuring that security solutions reach the market while the threats they address are still relevant.
*Result:* Thales is seeing a massive shift in engineering productivity and developer engagement, with 40 to 50% of developers already appearing in daily active user metrics for these AI tools. With Gemini powering the workflow, an AI-forward approach has slashed timelines while improving developer happiness by removing the burden of manual toil. Thales is now focused on scaling these localized successes across its entire global engineering organization to deliver high-value, secure solutions faster than ever before.
*Highlights and key takeaways from our interview with Ashvin Kamaraju, Global VP, Engineering and Cloud Operations, and Alain Michaud, Engineering CTO:*
→ “Having AI take away those mundane tasks or those repetitive little paper cuts that are dragging the velocity down goes a long way into helping developers own our journey and focusing on work and overall happiness.”
→ “The extensibility of the CLI is probably what matters more to our engineering teams: how we can plug into it, how we can expand it, and how we can use it better.”
→ “With Gemini Code Assist, we want to innovate faster, create more secure products, and drive more value to our customer.”
*Google Cloud products used:* Gemini CLI, Gemini Code Assist
*Learn more:*
https://codeassist.google/
geminicli.com
*Featured in this video:* Ashvin Kamaraju, Global VP, Engineering and Cloud Operations, and Alain Michaud, Engineering CTO, Thales Cyber Security Products
*Executive summary:* Thales, an advanced security and digital identity provider, is on a mission to build a future that’s based on trust. To counter rapidly evolving threats, Thales Cybersecurity Products division adopted an AI-forward approach using Gemini Code Assist and Gemini CLI. By integrating Gemini into CI/CD pipelines and the full software development lifecycle, Thales is eliminating the technical debt and engineering toil, allowing developers to focus on building more secure products at unprecedented speeds.
*Challenge:* Cybersecurity threats change almost daily. Thales engineers needed to innovate faster to mitigate these emerging threats, but they were often slowed down by significant technical debt and mundane tasks. This meant that traditional development timelines for complex security features could span anywhere from months to over a year. Beyond speed, the toil of repetitive coding tasks led to frequent context switching, which impacted both developer satisfaction and the overall efficiency of the engineering organization.
*Solution:* Thales expanded its long-standing relationship with Google by deploying Gemini Code Assist and Gemini CLI across its cybersecurity business line. The team focused on an AI-first software development lifecycle, where AI takes on the repetitive, low-value scaffolding work, freeing engineers to move higher up the value chain and apply the creativity and engineering judgment that truly delivers value to customers. A key differentiator for Thales was the extensibility of Gemini CLI, which allowed engineering teams to plug the tool directly into their specific workflows and custom CI/CD pipelines. This integration aims to shrink the entire development cycle, from ideation through deployment, ensuring that security solutions reach the market while the threats they address are still relevant.
*Result:* Thales is seeing a massive shift in engineering productivity and developer engagement, with 40 to 50% of developers already appearing in daily active user metrics for these AI tools. With Gemini powering the workflow, an AI-forward approach has slashed timelines while improving developer happiness by removing the burden of manual toil. Thales is now focused on scaling these localized successes across its entire global engineering organization to deliver high-value, secure solutions faster than ever before.
*Highlights and key takeaways from our interview with Ashvin Kamaraju, Global VP, Engineering and Cloud Operations, and Alain Michaud, Engineering CTO:*
→ “Having AI take away those mundane tasks or those repetitive little paper cuts that are dragging the velocity down goes a long way into helping developers own our journey and focusing on work and overall happiness.”
→ “The extensibility of the CLI is probably what matters more to our engineering teams: how we can plug into it, how we can expand it, and how we can use it better.”
→ “With Gemini Code Assist, we want to innovate faster, create more secure products, and drive more value to our customer.”
*Google Cloud products used:* Gemini CLI, Gemini Code Assist
*Learn more:*
https://codeassist.google/
geminicli.com
