What Is Platform Engineering?
Platform Engineering, Monday, June 29th, 2026
Platform engineering builds shared infrastructure and workflows that let teams ship software quickly, safely, and at scale.
Alan Shimel defines platform engineering as the discipline of designing shared infrastructure, tooling, and automated workflows that let teams deliver applications quickly, safely, and at scale. The central thesis is that the discipline continuously evolves because applications evolve, making it fundamentally adaptive rather than fixed.
It traces an evolution from informal middleware-based platforms, through the Kubernetes era and internal developer platforms that treat developers as customers, to data and observability becoming core capabilities, and now AI integration requiring GPU provisioning, model serving, and governance. Looking ahead, platforms increasingly manage autonomous agents needing identity, guardrails, and auditability.