With AI taking over tasks that once required entire departments, many solo founders are now creating multi-million-dollar companies on their own.
According to an analysis by payments company Stripe, thousands of solo operators on its platform are now generating more than $1 million in annual revenue, with their numbers doubling between 2023 and 2025.
The number of solo founders crossing the $10 million revenue threshold nearly tripled over the same period, reported WSJ citing analysis.
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Ernie Tedeschi, Stripe's chief economist, said AI has removed a longstanding barrier for entrepreneurs who previously lacked business contacts or commercial know-how to get ideas off the ground. "Now, AI can be a built-in business partner," he said, according to the report.
AI is helping solo founders manage everything from administrative work to coding, making it easier to build and scale a business without hiring a team. The trend has been particularly strong in the tech sector, where AI can take on many core technical tasks.
Julian Weisser, who runs a San Francisco-based accelerator for solo founders in tech, told the WSJ that the barrier to starting a company has fallen sharply as AI tools mature.
The programme, which offers seed funding and mentorship in exchange for equity, received 4,500 applications for just 10 slots in its latest cycle, nearly five times the number it attracted when it launched in May last year, according to the report.
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Among those profiled was Ben Broca, a 40-year-old entrepreneur who launched an AI tools company for entrepreneurs last December and now runs it as a one-man operation, aided extensively by AI, from his living room in Sausalito, California.
His company has already signed up 10,000 paying customers and is on track to generate $10 million in revenue this year, according to the WSJ.
The report said it's still too early to know how AI will reshape the job market. While many Americans worry that the technology could replace jobs, economists say it could also create entirely new kinds of work. At the same time, AI is making it possible for individuals to build businesses that once needed full teams to run.
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