How Virgin Atlantic ships faster with Codex
OpenAI Blog · 2026-05-22
Virgin Atlantic used OpenAI Codex to reduce legacy codebase size by 78-80%, achieve near-100% unit test coverage on a new mobile app, and compress two-week refactoring tasks to under 30 minutes.
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Extraction
Topics: ai-coding-toolsenterprise-aisoftware-deliverylegacy-modernization
Claims
- Codex reduced Virgin Atlantic's legacy codebase size by 78-80% in refactoring tasks.
- The new mobile app shipped with near-100% unit test coverage and zero P1 defects at launch.
- Refactoring work that previously took two weeks now takes 30 minutes to an hour with Codex.
- Analyst teams across the airline can now build internal data applications directly without routing work through a central AI team.
- Engineering velocity with Codex has grown faster than surrounding delivery processes like backlog grooming and sprint planning.
Key quotes
The ability to utilize Codex to improve the quality of the application before it got into the hands of our customers was a game-changer for us.
We're seeing in some instances anywhere from 78 to 80% reduction in codebase size from utilizing Codex.
The trajectory of Codex is thinking beyond pure engineers. It's moving into a real tool for everyone.