Christchurch-based founder Igor Costa, who helped make GitHub Copilot a global force, is building an open alternative to it through his company Autohand. GitHub Copilot marked the moment artificial intelligence became a practical colleague for millions of software developers, allowing AI to suggest code, explain unfamiliar code, and help turn ideas into working software. It changed expectations of developer tools and opened the door to a new generation of AI coding agents. Costa was involved in that development and is now working on an open alternative from Christchurch.