Software observability startup Lightrun Inc. today launched a new Model Context Protocol solution that offers fully integrated Runtime Context for artificial intelligence code-writing assistants.

The new solution is pitched as a “step change” in autonomous code writing that gives tools such as Cursor and GitHub Copilot full visibility into how code behaves after deployment. In doing so, it fills in what Lightrun claims is a missing piece of the AI development ecosystem.

The MCP solution seeks to address the issue that AI assistants can generate code rapidly, but, as shown in studies, fail at high rates once exposed to real-world traffic, dependencies and workloads. Added to the mix is that once the code leaves the integrated development environment or IDE, AI cannot see what takes place in staging, preproduction or production, forcing teams to spend lengthy amounts of time debugging and refactoring bad code.

Lightrun’s Runtime Context directly addresses the problems by bridging the gap between the IDE, the AI assistant and runtime to provide crucial context to the agent and the developer behind it.

Using the new solution, developers can ask their coding assistant to check staging traffic before writing a module, investigate a production failure or add the instrumentation needed to validate behavior.

Lightrun’s MCP acts as a secure bridge to allow AI agents to add logs and traces in real time, capture snapshots, investigate issues safely and even suggest fixes, all without requiring engineers to manually reproduce issues. Developers can then fix the code with a single rebuild and verify immediately, reducing resolution time from days to minutes.

“AI has taken over much of the creative part of coding,” said co-founder and Chief Executive Ilan Peleg. “However, debugging across environments has remained painfully manual. With Runtime Context, AI can finally participate in the full lifecycle by writing code, validating and debugging it and remediating issues based on real-world behavior.”

The Runtime Context model enables AI tools to trigger remote debugging sessions across staging, preproduction and production environments, access production-grade telemetry in real time, propose fixes based on actual runtime behavior and deliver code that is reliable, stable and ready for deployment.

With the release, Lightrun customers gain access to faster debugging cycles, higher deployment reliability and AI-generated code that better withstands real traffic and dependencies.

Lightrun is a venture capital-backed startup that has raised $115 million in funding across four rounds, including rounds of $18 million in July 2024 and $70 million in April. Investors in the company include Insight Partners LP, Glilot Capital Partners LP, GTM Capital, Sorenson Capital, Accel Partners LP and Citigroup Inc.

Image: Lightrun