Our Breakpoint 2026 speaker spotlight series continues with Julio de Lima, QA Manager at Capco. By day, Julio leads QA at one of the world's largest tech consultancies. Outside business hours, he runs a YouTube channel teaching software testing to the Brazilian community and delivers tutorials at major industry events. He's been studying AI in testing since 2018, when he started his master's degree on the subject, well before it became the topic everyone wanted to talk about.
At Breakpoint 2026, he's running a live build session in which he'll write an API from scratch, design tests for it, automate them, and push them through a pipeline using AI code assistants like Copilot.
You're a QA Manager at Capco by day and an educator with a YouTube channel teaching testers in Brazil. How do you balance both?
My teaching activities take place outside of business hours, which leaves me free to do both without one interfering with the other. Working at Capco motivates me every day because there's always a new challenge and this dynamic environment where I'm always challenging myself and learning more. Regarding my role as a teacher and content creator, I'd say that's the fuel that keeps me connected to the community.
For me, teaching is more than just being in charge of something; it's about seeing my students grow and become relevant to the market, and thus achieve their personal and professional goals. I learn, I share, someone learns, uses what they've learned, and grows. Is there anything more wonderful than that?
Can you give us a sneak peek into your Breakpoint session?
Sure, I've been delivering a three-and-a-half-hour tutorial at some of the world's leading software testing events, and I decided to bring a shorter version of it to Breakpoint so our community can see and understand how AI can contribute to software testing activities in practice.
In this talk, we learn how to build an API from scratch, create automated tests, and run them in the pipeline. Participants will see this entire process and leave full of ideas on how to build and test software with AI; it will be fantastic.
What's a belief you had about AI in testing a year ago that you've since changed your mind on?
My perception of AI has remained the same since 2018, when I started my master's degree in AI and Software Testing: It has helped me to be much more productive as a professional tester. The world we live in today is a golden age, where we can leverage the machine's capabilities to help us accelerate our work as QAs.
It's not about asking and accepting, but rather about asking technically and reviewing what has been brought to you with attention and care. This attention, care, and technical skill are what differentiate a professional tester who uses AI responsibly from the rest.
Most testers know API testing matters, but when it comes to getting started, where do people get stuck?
I believe it's the absence of a graphical interface and the greater possibility of data variation (given the freedom to fill payloads with any information). The point where I started to understand how to deal with this was when I realized that API testing is divided into 3 parts: testing the business rules, testing the API interface (whether it meets what its specification describes), and non-functional factors (such as backward compatibility, performance, reliability, interoperability, etc.).
If we think of it as a component that connects to other components, and define these other components that call it as personas, the modeling of your tests will be much simpler. Remember also that APIs are part of a more technical universe, so understanding more about databases, software architecture, queues, messaging, logs, etc. will make you more comfortable when working on their tests.
What do you like to do when you're away from the screen?
I enjoy longboarding, bodyweight exercises, running, playing my instruments (the flute is my current instrument, before it was the cello), and spending time with my wife and daughter at Disney parks.
Julio is one of several practitioners bringing hands-on perspective to Breakpoint 2026. He'll be joined by Keith Klain (Director of Quality Engineering, KPMG), Jason Huggins (Founder, Selenium and Vibium), Marc Boroditsky (Technology Leader, Nebius), Avinash Ahuja (Manager Solution Architect, NVIDIA), Lena Nyström (CEO, Test Scouts AB), Brittany Stewart (Senior QA Specialist, QualityWorks Consulting Group), Pramod Yadav (Test and Automation Specialist, Power Tester), and more. It's a lineup built for testers who want to leave with something they can use on Monday. Register here to catch Julio's session.
