<description>&lt;p&gt;Data migrations have long been the costly, painful bottleneck of modernization, dragging on for years and carrying multi-million-dollar price tags. But AI is already flipping that script.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Gleb Mezhanskiy, founder &amp;amp; CEO of Datafold, who has been deep in the trenches of AI-driven migrations, joins us on the Data T podcast to unpack how AI automation is finally making it realistic to move off entrenched legacy ETL tools. Drawing on his years as a hands-on data engineer and PM (including leading a massive migration initiative at Lyft), Gleb explains where migrations go off the rails: millions of lines of legacy code and lack of automation lead to massive human time sunk into reconciliation and QA. He shares how Datafold attacks the problem end-to-end, using agents and data diffing to translate and validate at scale, so teams can “lift and shift” quickly, then refactor with confidence on modern stacks like Snowflake and Coalesce.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;Beyond migrations, Gleb and podcast host, Coalesce co-founder and CEO Armon Petrossian, dig into how AI is reshaping data engineering itself. They argue AI won’t replace great engineers; it elevates them, shifting work from tedious rewrites to higher-leverage design, governance, and outcomes. The teams that master AI-assisted workflows, evaluation, and modern patterns will widen the gap, moving from weeks of manual effort to rapid, continuous delivery.&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;Key Topics&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;ul&gt;&lt;li&gt;Data migration challenges&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;The role of AI in data migrations&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;Limitations of generic AI tools and LLM models for migration projects&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;How AI is reshaping data engineering roles&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;Predictions for data infrastructure&lt;/li&gt;&lt;li&gt;AI for productivity&lt;/li&gt;&lt;/ul&gt;</description>

The Data T

Armon Petrossian and Satish Jayanthi

Gleb Mezhanskiy on Rewriting the Migration Playbook with AI

OCT 30, 202542 MIN
The Data T

Gleb Mezhanskiy on Rewriting the Migration Playbook with AI

OCT 30, 202542 MIN

Description

<p>Data migrations have long been the costly, painful bottleneck of modernization, dragging on for years and carrying multi-million-dollar price tags. But AI is already flipping that script.</p><p>Gleb Mezhanskiy, founder &amp; CEO of Datafold, who has been deep in the trenches of AI-driven migrations, joins us on the Data T podcast to unpack how AI automation is finally making it realistic to move off entrenched legacy ETL tools. Drawing on his years as a hands-on data engineer and PM (including leading a massive migration initiative at Lyft), Gleb explains where migrations go off the rails: millions of lines of legacy code and lack of automation lead to massive human time sunk into reconciliation and QA. He shares how Datafold attacks the problem end-to-end, using agents and data diffing to translate and validate at scale, so teams can “lift and shift” quickly, then refactor with confidence on modern stacks like Snowflake and Coalesce.</p><p>Beyond migrations, Gleb and podcast host, Coalesce co-founder and CEO Armon Petrossian, dig into how AI is reshaping data engineering itself. They argue AI won’t replace great engineers; it elevates them, shifting work from tedious rewrites to higher-leverage design, governance, and outcomes. The teams that master AI-assisted workflows, evaluation, and modern patterns will widen the gap, moving from weeks of manual effort to rapid, continuous delivery.</p><p><strong>Key Topics</strong></p><ul><li>Data migration challenges</li><li>The role of AI in data migrations</li><li>Limitations of generic AI tools and LLM models for migration projects</li><li>How AI is reshaping data engineering roles</li><li>Predictions for data infrastructure</li><li>AI for productivity</li></ul>