Microsoft’s and Google’s dueling developer conferences reveal opposite AI strategies—and a big weakness for one company

In the span of one day and 750 miles, two of tech’s biggest companies put on conferences for their armies of developers this week. And while both Microsoft’s Build and Google’s I/O conferences were all about AI, the dueling convocations highlighted how the two industry behemoths are each seeking to conquer the market through radically different strategies.

Both companies made a big push into AI coding assistants that can autonomously build and test software—with Microsoft announcing...