There was a time when success in technology was measured by one thing: "Do you have an app?" Every startup, bank, retailer, airline, logistics company, hospital, and government agency eventually built one. It made sense because smartphones became the primary computing platform, and mobile applications became the gateway to digital services.
Fast forward to today, and I wonder if we're approaching the limits of that model, where users and customers have to open their phones and scroll through several applications before getting to the right one.
How many of them do we actually use every week? How many did we download for a single transaction? How many sit untouched, taking up storage because deleting them feels like more effort than keeping them?
I'm beginning to think we've reached a point where we're optimising for distribution rather than user experience.
The Problem Isn't More Apps
It is easy to believe that every new product deserves its own application. From a company's perspective, an app creates a direct relationship with customers. It enables push notifications, analytics, personalisation, loyalty programs, and a controlled digital experience.
But from the customer's perspective, every new app comes with hidden costs.
- Another account to create.
- Another password to remember.
- Another update to download.
- Another permission request.
- Another notification competing for attention.
- Another interface to learn.
Individually, none of these feels significant. Collectively, they create friction.
As users, we don't wake up wanting another application on our phones. We simply want a problem solved as quickly and effortlessly as possible. That distinction is becoming increasingly important.
Technology companies have spent years solving how to deliver products digitally. The next challenge is something different: how should customers consume those products? This boils down from optimising distribution to optimising consumption.
Ordering food isn't really about opening a food delivery app, and neither is booking a flight, applying for a loan, shopping for clothes, nor browsing another e-commerce interface. The customer simply wants an outcome; the interface is merely a means to an end in achieving it.
For years, apps have been the dominant interface because they were the best option available. I doubt that will remain the best option forever.
Putting this into context in terms of distribution and consumption:
Ride hailing. Distribution: download the app, create an account, verify your number. Consumption: I just want to get from Lekki to Victoria Island.
Banking. Distribution: install the bank app. Consumption: I just want to transfer 50,000 naira.
Food delivery. Distribution: install the restaurant's app. Consumption: I just want jollof rice delivered before 8 p.m.
You'd likely notice something: the user never wanted the app; they wanted the outcome. The app was simply the bridge to that outcome.
Agentic Systems Are Quietly Changing What an Interface Can Be
The conversation around artificial intelligence often focuses on models, automation, or productivity. I think a more interesting shift is happening elsewhere: artificial intelligence is changing the interface itself.
Instead of having five different applications, imagine asking a trusted AI assistant:
- "Book my annual medical check-up next Friday."
- "Reorder the groceries I bought last month."
- "Find a black blazer under 80,000 naira that matches my previous purchases."
Notice what disappears: there is no need to remember which application provides the service. No navigation, no searching through menus, and no need for a user to learn another user interface. The customer expresses intent while the system coordinates everything else. That's a fundamentally different interaction model.
The Rise of Agentic Systems
This is where Agentic AI becomes particularly interesting. Unlike traditional assistants that simply answer questions, agentic systems can plan, make decisions, coordinate across services, execute tasks, verify outcomes, and return results.
Instead of acting as a search engine, they become digital representatives acting on behalf of the user. This changes how software will be designed. Rather than asking, "How do users navigate our application?" product teams will be asking, "How does an intelligent agent interact with our platform?"
That single question has architectural implications, as products will need secure APIs instead of tightly controlled user journeys. Authentication models will evolve from user sessions to delegated permissions for trusted agents with strict guardrails. Business logic will become more important than interface design, and documentation will become as valuable as visual polish.
In many ways, products become platforms, or better still, products as a service. As far back as I can remember, competitive advantage came from building better interfaces; it may now come from building the most accessible services.
This will definitely be built around thinking differently, where we consider:
- API-first and MCP architecture rather than UI-first development.
- Fine-grained permissions for AI agents.
- Machine-readable documentation.
- Event-driven systems that allow intelligent orchestration.
- Identity and trust between organisations and external agents.
- Observability, audit trails, and governance for autonomous actions.
Update: The Argument Tested Itself
I wrote the section above using ride hailing as a hypothetical. The next morning I found that ChatGPT had opened up to ride-hailing services, so I ran a quick test.
ChatGPT returning live Bolt fares for a Lagos route, from Allen Junction in Ikeja to Victoria Island
No app opened. No account created. I described where I was and where I wanted to go, and the fares came back in the conversation: Basic at 8,900 naira, Bolt at 10,900, Priority at 11,900, Comfort at 13,300. The exact flow the article described as a possible future was already working.
The second screenshot is the part I keep returning to.
The Bolt listing inside ChatGPT's app directory, showing developer, category, version, and a Try in chat button
That is an app store listing. Developer, category, version number, and an install-equivalent call to action. It just happens to live inside a chat assistant rather than on a home screen.
Which raises the question: perhaps the next app store won't be an app store at all, but an agent store. If that happens, it won't just change how software is discovered and consumed. It will introduce a new class of security, identity, privacy, and data governance challenges. The attack surface won't disappear. It will evolve.
The Second Chasm
To be clear, I don't believe mobile applications will disappear anytime soon. There will always be scenarios where rich, immersive interfaces matter, whether for gaming, creative work, finance, design, or complex enterprise operations. What changes is not the existence of applications, but the role they play in how customers access digital services.
For everyday tasks, we're approaching an important shift where users care more about outcomes and ease, not whether they interact through an app, a website, a social channel, voice, augmented reality, or an autonomous AI agent.
As builders, we may have spent the last fifteen years perfecting digital destinations. The next decade will belong to those who build invisible experiences, where technology fades into the background, intent becomes the interface, and services are available wherever the customer already is. Perhaps the next generation of great products won't be remembered because they had the best app, but because users never had to think about the app at all.
Geoffrey Moore, in Crossing the Chasm, argued that the defining challenge for high-tech products was crossing the gap between early adopters and the mainstream market. As we enter the age of agentic systems, I believe we're approaching a different chasm. The companies that succeed won't simply build better applications; they'll build services that users no longer have to think about. The future belongs not to the products people download, but to the platforms their trusted agents choose to use on their behalf.
Maybe the next competitive technical advantage isn't building another app, but making sure users never need to open one.