The speaker presented the challenges of updating everything and introduced the project Update CLI, a command-line tool used to automate updating processes for projects. By specifying a manifest, Update CLI detects the source of truth, applies conditions and identifies the state of files on Git repositories. The speaker discussed declarative, discovery, and monitoring approaches to updating and compared Update CLI to Dependabot and Renovatebot. While Renovatebot is better at automation, it is not as supportive for complex updates as Update CLI.