Interview: Robert Yue, Tricentis

What is the major potential tech pain point that will face all organisations large and small in 2023?

One of the major pain points for all organisations is their reliance on manual testing of software rather than automation. This is resource-heavy, time-consuming and lacks quality, which introduces unsustainable delays. Organisations including government are forced to cut corners, not test at all or delay the release. Many organisations are in the midst of a digital transformation and not meeting deadlines leads to both delays and budget overspend.

The challenge for organisations is to decide how and when to automate their systems and what is the best use of automation.

What’s on your tech wish list from governments, innovators and the wider industry in 2023?

For government and innovators, the tech wish list would be the implementation of Agile+DevOps and codeless test automation. As the software development and delivery landscape continues to evolve, it has become increasingly critical for enterprises to prioritise both speed and quality to keep pace with Agile and DevOps environments to meet customer needs and avoid loss of revenue. Codeless test automation gives everyone the ability to create test scripts without writing code. This enables all users to simply interact via a user interface with the application and be able to define and refine steps and execute these tests. Hard-coded, test automation requires dedicated expertise in programming, whereas codeless test automation means the whole team, regardless of their coding skills, can contribute to the test automation effort. Reducing test case maintenance and utilising resources more efficiently can drastically cut costs and propel business efficiency forward.

Which new technologies will reach critical mass and become dominant in 2023?

I anticipate that codeless, AI-driven test automation will become dominant. DevOps teams are taking the bottlenecks out of testing and the risks out of software releases through computer vision and convolutional neural networks, creating test automation at the UI layer to process contextual information. Additionally, self-healing capabilities address frequent application changes that would require flakiness and maintenance, reducing the overall time and effort spent by developers. Lastly, automated testing is allowing DevOps teams to minimise risk when determining the impact of code and data changes, lowering the regression testing effort and increasing test coverage.

Just last year, one of the reasons Sydney Trains decided to deploy codeless software testing was because of the ability for the team to learn the tool quickly. The team was able to download a free version of the tool and leverage online Tricentis Academy programs to learn how to create an automated test.

How is the current talent shortage impacting your industry and how will this be overcome in 2023?

Australian organisations and government teams are currently finding it difficult to find people to hire with the right skills to be a software tester. By automating testing, testers and developers can do more with less — spending less time on each project, putting in more focus on other strategic initiatives to advance larger business goals. Additionally, low- and no-code infrastructure in automated testing enables developers to push the burden of maintenance on the platform instead of managing it themselves. In this role, these employees worry less about the systems in place, and can instead look ahead at more advanced deliverables of each project while ultimately driving business value for the organisation.

Robert Yue is Tricentis’s Vice President for ANZ and is responsible for driving the company’s expansion and go-to-market strategy across the region. He has over 20 years of senior management experience and has held various business and technology positions, including in government organisations.