Social media agency founder Ashley Rector used an AI-powered tool to guide her in deciding whether to form an LLC for a new business idea.
ZenBusiness
When Ashley Rector, founder of digital marketing and social media agency quimby digital, He was considering turning a new product line into his own business, he turned to an AI-powered tool for guidance.
As a user of ZenBusiness, an AI-powered platform that helps founders with business formation and compliance, she used the Velo AI guide built into that platform. Velo, whom the company considers an “AI co-founder,” provides his clients with guidance on the “next right step” in building their businesses.
“I set out to launch a new line of products and wanted LLC protection for it, so I asked Velo to help me determine if the business idea made sense,” he said in a statement. “It gave me a foundation and allowed me to think about what I needed to do next.”
Once she decided to move forward with the LLC, Velo helped her keep it up to date, keep up with annual filings, and obtain her EIN. “I even asked Velo about my target market and he explained exactly how to do the analysis,” he said.
ZenBusinessan Austin, Texas-based B Corp, announced today that it is expanding the Velo AI roadmap with open access and new capabilities. The expanded experience is centered around the Velo “blueprint,” designed to show you the steps, tools, and guidance relevant to your situation. As they complete the steps, generate business ideas, validate opportunities, estimate startup costs, and advise on entity selection. It has allowed those who create a free account to save their plan and view it from any device. Almost 75% of ZenBusiness clients are individual traders.
Ross Buhrdorf, CEO and founder of Austin, Texas-based ZenBusiness, is expanding the site’s tools in anticipation of a boom in small business creation, in which many people displaced by AI will turn to solopreneurship.
“At ZenBusiness, we provide the business plan part, we have the part that includes your financials and we have the part that talks about what it’s going to cost to start this business,” Buhrdorf said in an interview yesterday. “We’re allowing all of this and we’re trying to make these people successful, because it’s a wave that’s coming. People are going to be displaced, and what are they doing to do? They’re going to have to do something. And so what we really want to do at ZenBusiness is be there to help them.”
Applications for the creation of new companies will reach a record of 5.62 million in 2025, 8.2% more than in 2024, according to data from the US Census Bureau. This is about double the pre-pandemic baseline of about 3.5 million in 2019. The growth of these apps has increased about 17% in 2026, year to date.
Ross Buhrdorf, CEO and founder of ZenBusiness, believes more people will start businesses as AI drives displacement in the world of work.
ZenBusiness
Buhrdorf leverages his experience as a serial entrepreneur to build the ZenBusiness platform. He was previously co-founder and CTO of HomeAway, a vacation rental marketplace acquired by Expedia in 2015 for $3.9 billion. ZenBusiness, founded that same year, has grown to 600 employees and a valuation of more than $1 billion, according to Buhrdorf.
ZenBusiness first introduced Velo in July 2025 and has handled more than 2 million conversations since then, the company says. Resolves customer needs using Velo AI guidance in 72% of conversations and directs others to human team members if additional judgment, empathy or certainty is needed, according to the company. More than half of its customers have used Velo and 53% return to it in the same month, the company found.
In developing Velo, ZenBusiness responded to data showing that among its nearly one million small business customers, many are looking for information related to the stage they have reached in the business process, such as launching a website or trying to determine if they need a license. The tool identifies action steps for them.
Buhrdorf says ZenBusiness is simultaneously focusing on curating solutions for its users, partnering with companies like website builder Squarespace as more people create their own opportunities through entrepreneurship.
“Companies have to accept this change because it is coming,” he said.