{"id":268026,"date":"2026-06-09T04:07:00","date_gmt":"2026-06-09T08:07:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/06\/09\/mercury-ceo-says-ai-is-breaking-the-old-startup-model\/"},"modified":"2026-06-09T04:30:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-09T08:30:10","slug":"mercury-ceo-says-ai-is-breaking-the-old-startup-model","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/2026\/06\/09\/mercury-ceo-says-ai-is-breaking-the-old-startup-model\/","title":{"rendered":"Mercury CEO Says AI Is Breaking the Old Startup Model"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mercury CEO Says AI Is Breaking the Old Startup Model<\/a><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.pymnts.com\/artificial-intelligence-2\/2026\/mercury-ceo-says-ai-is-breaking-the-old-startup-model\/<\/a><\/p>\n

Publish Date: 2026-06-09 04:07:00<\/a><\/p>\n

Source Domain: www.pymnts.com<\/a><\/p>\n

The distance between an idea and a functioning business has rarely been shorter. Entrepreneurs operate in a business environment where artificial intelligence (AI) is lowering the cost of starting companies. As result it is accelerating business formation and creating demand for banking experiences built around software rather than branch networks.<\/p>\n

That shift is forcing financial institutions to reconsider how they serve entrepreneurs.<\/p>\n

It was top of mind during a conversation with PYMNTS CEO Karen Webster and Mercury Co-Founder and CEO Immad Akhund. The shift sits behind Mercury\u2019s recent $200 million Series D funding round, which valued the company at $5.2 billion and followed four consecutive years of profitability. The company also recently received conditional approval from the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to establish Mercury Bank, N.A.<\/p>\n

Akhund said the activities come as a new generation of entrepreneurs is rising.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe saw 2.5x increase in applications in Q1 this year versus Q1 last year,\u201d Akhund told Webster, noting that AI tools are making it possible for founders to build and launch businesses with fewer resources than were previously required.<\/p>\n

Mercury\u2019s customer base was initially concentrated among venture-backed startups. Today, it extends across eCommerce, professional services and a broader collection of digitally native businesses. More than 300,000 customers use its platform.<\/p>\n

Advertisement: Scroll to Continue<\/p>\n

Webster framed the change as one of the defining characteristics of the current technology cycle.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe velocity at which these businesses are being created is really astounding,\u201d she observed during the discussion. \u201cI think it\u2019s exciting.\u201d<\/p>\n

Building the Anti-Legacy Bank<\/strong><\/h2>\n

Akhund\u2019s view of traditional banking reflects his own experience as a founder. Before launching Mercury, he spent years building technology companies and navigating the challenges of entrepreneurship.<\/p>\n

\u201cPart of the reason I started Mercury is…<\/p>\n

Source<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mercury CEO Says AI Is Breaking the Old Startup Model https:\/\/www.pymnts.com\/artificial-intelligence-2\/2026\/mercury-ceo-says-ai-is-breaking-the-old-startup-model\/ Publish Date: 2026-06-09 04:07:00…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":268027,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.pymnts.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/CORRECTED-Need-to-Know-Main-Feature-Mercury-Immad-Akhund-1.png","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-268026","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-artificial-intelligence"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268026"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=268026"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268026\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":268028,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268026\/revisions\/268028"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/268027"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=268026"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=268026"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news-you-need.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=268026"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}