The Future of Generative AI in Software Engineering: A Vision from Industry and Academia in the European GENIUS Project
Robin Gröpler, Steffen Klepke, Jack Johns, Andreas Dreschinski, Klaus Schmid, Benedikt Dornauer, Eray Tüzün, Joost Noppen, Mohammad Reza Mousavi, Yongjian Tang, Johannes Viehmann, Selin Şirin Aslangül, Beum Seuk Lee, Adam Ziolkowski, Eric Zie
TL;DR
The paper addresses the fragmentation of GenAI adoption across the software development lifecycle and articulates a five-year vision to unify research and industrial practice. It presents a structured view of challenges—ranging from hallucinations and limited reasoning to security, bias, and sustainability—and proposes a cohesive GENIUS-led roadmap to address them through self-* systems, multimodal collaboration, and trustworthy AI. Concrete contributions include architectures and toolchains for end-to-end GenAI integration across requirements, design, and quality assurance, plus a governance framework for security, privacy, and long-term evaluation. The work highlights industrial validation via 14 use cases within GENIUS, aiming to deliver reliable, scalable, and industry-ready GenAI solutions for software engineering that align with European sovereignty and policy goals.
Abstract
Generative AI (GenAI) has recently emerged as a groundbreaking force in Software Engineering, capable of generating code, identifying bugs, recommending fixes, and supporting quality assurance. While its use in coding tasks shows considerable promise, applying GenAI across the entire Software Development Life Cycle (SDLC) has not yet been fully explored. Critical uncertainties in areas such as reliability, accountability, security, and data privacy demand deeper investigation and coordinated action. The GENIUS project, comprising over 30 European industrial and academic partners, aims to address these challenges by advancing AI integration across all SDLC phases. It focuses on GenAI's potential, the development of innovative tools, and emerging research challenges, actively shaping the future of software engineering. This vision paper presents a shared perspective on the future of GenAI-driven software engineering, grounded in cross-sector dialogue as well as experiences and findings within the GENIUS consortium. The paper explores four central elements: (1) a structured overview of current challenges in GenAI adoption across the SDLC; (2) a forward-looking vision outlining key technological and methodological advances expected over the next five years; (3) anticipated shifts in the roles and required skill sets of software professionals; and (4) the contribution of GENIUS in realising this transformation through practical tools and industrial validation. This paper focuses on aligning technical innovation with business relevance. It aims to inform both research agendas and industrial strategies, providing a foundation for reliable, scalable, and industry-ready GenAI solutions for software engineering teams.