{"id":559894,"date":"2026-07-21T01:00:09","date_gmt":"2026-07-21T01:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/559894\/"},"modified":"2026-07-21T01:00:09","modified_gmt":"2026-07-21T01:00:09","slug":"starting-a-business-has-become-a-lot-easier-heres-why-5-7-million-americans-took-the-leap-last-year","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/559894\/","title":{"rendered":"Starting a Business Has Become a Lot Easier \u2014 Here\u2019s Why 5.7 Million Americans Took the Leap Last Year"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a> Maskot | Getty Images <\/p>\n

Entrepreneur Media LLC and Yahoo Finance LLC may earn commission or revenue on some products and services through the links below. <\/p>\n

It’s a good time to open a business. There were 5.7 million applications to start new businesses <\/a>filed last year \u2014 the most in two decades of government tracking \u2014 and 2026 is on pace to beat it, the New York Times<\/a> reports. <\/p>\n

What’s behind the boom? That two-letter word: AI<\/a>. A University of British Columbia study found generative AI is “spurring entrepreneurial activity” by making it cheaper and faster to get a business off the ground. <\/p>\n

For example, Cassidy Winkler, a former flight attendant, used ChatGPT to help her build a business plan, name and logo for her Pilates studio, Revel Method Pilates, which now has three locations, 65 employees and a fourth studio on the way. <\/p>\n

But Winkler is an exception. Most of these new business applications are for companies that aren’t likely to hire anyone at all. AI is letting more solo founders skip building a team altogether. <\/p>\n

Subscribe to the Entrepreneur Daily newsletter<\/a> to get the news and resources you need today to help you build your business better. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Maskot | Getty Images Entrepreneur Media LLC and Yahoo Finance LLC may earn commission or revenue on some…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":559895,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[72,1776,4491,236679,191,61,60,11927],"class_list":["post-559894","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entrepreneurship","tag-business","tag-business-applications","tag-business-plan","tag-cassidy-winkler","tag-entrepreneurship","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-university-of-british-columbia"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559894","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=559894"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559894\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/559895"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=559894"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=559894"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=559894"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}