Key Takeaways Y Combinator leaders say that founders are increasingly submitting AI-generated responses to application prompts. The acclaimed startup accelerator has seen more applications that use the word “wedge” and sprinkle in em dashes, both signs of AI writing. YC applications have also increased in length by 60% over the past three years, a signal that founders are using AI to write lengthier responses. Y Combinator (YC), a well-known startup accelerator that helped launch companies like Reddit, DoorDash and Airbnb, has invested in more than 5,000 startups since 2005. Now YC leaders note that founders seem to be outsourcing writing…
Author: Staff Writer
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own. Key Takeaways Accountability is just a buzzword unless you can actually demonstrate how your business is becoming more accountable. Real accountability covers three groups: customers, talent and the public. I created a scorecard that breaks into 10 yes-or-no questions across these three areas. A low score isn’t a failure — it’s a roadmap for making changes. Make any question you answered “no” to your priority when moving forward. Founders love to talk about accountability because it makes them look like responsible leaders. But unless you can specifically demonstrate how your business is…
Key Takeaways Michael Browning Jr. is the founder and CEO of Unleashed Brands, the $1 billion youth enrichment platform company that includes Urban Air, The Little Gym and Sylvan Learning. Unleashed Brands has more than 1,600 locations nationwide and serves more than 25 million people. In 2025, Unleashed Brands opened 133 new franchise locations with more than 200 franchises in development. When Michael Browning Jr. tried to launch a trampoline park in 2011, every bank and investor rejected him. His age was a factor — he was 26 years old at the time. Investors said he was too young and that…
ASIA: The major Asian stock markets had a mixed day today: • NIKKEI 225 decreased 76.55 points or -0.12% to 65,606.71 • Shanghai increased 39.685 points or 1.02% to 3,940.037 • Hang Seng increased 137.75 points or 0.54% to 25,668.03 • ASX 200 decreased 8.00 points or -0.09% to 9,263.60 • SENSEX decreased 455.59 points or -0.58% to 78,499.17 • Nifty50 decreased 65.35 points or -0.27% to 24,570.65 The major Asian currency markets had a mixed day today: • AUDUSD increased 0.00337 or 0.48% to 0.70660 • NZDUSD increased 0.00233 or 0.40% to 0.58933 • USDJPY decreased 0.923 or -0.58%…
Wendy’s deals might be “biggie.” But it’s performance this year hasn’t been. On an earnings call that felt more like a public reckoning, executives for The Wendy’s Company shared that the Dublin, Ohio-based chain was “clearly not earning at [its] potential.” In the first half of the year, Wendy’s faced slowing sales, lower restaurant traffic, and a slew of store closures. The company announced it will cut its dividend in half—from 14 cents a share to 7—as it attempts to stabilize profit through a struggling turnaround. Q2 insights: sales dipped and stores closed Despite a generated net income of $32.6…
Crocs sells its chunky clogs to 150 million customers across 100 countries every year. But when tax season rolls around, the Broomfield, Colorado company has claimed that all of those global profits were actually earned in a two-person office in Malta, according to the New York Times. Crocs isn’t the only one. Accounting giants KPMG, PwC, Deloitte and EY have been aggressively marketing similar strategies, and companies including LinkedIn, Abbott Laboratories, Victoria’s Secret, Kraft Heinz, PepsiCo and Skechers have all set up shell entities on the island. The number of Maltese subsidiaries created by U.S. companies has jumped nearly 70%…
Four of Google’s top AI researchers are leaving to start their own company, and Google is backing them on the way out. Jeff Dean, Google’s chief scientist and a 27-year veteran of the company, is joining Sanjay Ghemawat, Oriol Vinyals and Quoc Le to found Discovery Loop, according to Wired. Google is taking a stake in the startup and will provide cloud compute for its first year. The goal is to automate scientific discovery itself. Propose an experiment, run it, evaluate the results, then repeat, thousands of times over, across fields like drug discovery, chip design and material science. Dean…
According to formal complaints lodged by Lebanon with the United Nations, Israel did spray a toxic herbicide over agricultural land in southern Lebanon as Netanyahu sought to adopt a scorched earth atactic. The Lebanese government has formally accused Israel of using this as a method of warfare. The core of the Lebanese complaint focuses on an incident in February 2026, where Israel allegedly used the herbicide glyphosate. Lebanon’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs filed official complaints with the UN Security Council based on a report from its National Council for Scientific Research. Soil samples taken from border villages showed glyphosate levels as…
A New Mexico judge ordered Meta on Thursday to pay $567 million into a fund for youth mental health, and to make real changes to how the platform treats teen users, according to CNN. It’s the second big penalty in this case. A jury already found Meta liable back in March and ordered $375 million in damages. The order is not just about money. Meta now has to delete accounts and personal data belonging to users under 13, make teen accounts private by default, and turn off push notifications for under-18 users during school hours and late at night. The…
Burger King‘s domestic same-store sales rose 8.5% for the three months ending June 30, according to the Wall Street Journal. The secret sauce? The Whopper. Earlier this year, Burger King reworked its signature burger’s ingredients and even its box. “A lot of people are saying they’re coming back for the first time in a long time,” said Tom Curtis, president of the chain’s US and Canada business. Curtis said Burger King is picking up market share, and believes some of it is coming directly from McDonald’s, which has struggled with declining traffic after recent promotions and marketing missed the mark.…