• Banking could be "redefined" by as much as 40% by 2030, a new report predicts.
• The report says AI will fundamentally reshape many aspects of what banks do.
• It was prepared by ThoughtLinks, led by veteran banking exec Sumeet Chabria.

A new report attempts to put hard numbers on a question hanging over every Wall Street corner office: just how much of banking work will AI actually change?

Artificial intelligence is on track to redefine 44% of the work done at banks by 2030, according to ThoughtLinks, an independent consulting firm.

ThoughtLinks — which is led by founder and CEO Sumeet Chabria, a former tech and operations COO at Bank of America and a Wall Street veteran — mapped nearly 5,000 individual banking "processes" to see which roles or units at banks will experience the most upheaval in their roles.

ThoughtLinks found that tech, engineering, and infrastructure—collectively considered one sector — would be most susceptible to transformation, with a projection of 55% of the work involved in that sector being redefined by 2030. It's a logical outcome, considering how many of the tasks in these fields are precisely the kinds that automation is best suited to handle.

Front office, client-facing sectors are hardly immune. Commercial banking could be redefined by as much as 49% by 2030, wealth management to the tune of 42%, and investment banking by as much as 33%, according to the report.

Wall Street banks are investing heavily to compete. JPMorgan has deployed a large language model suite to its 200,000 employees, while Goldman Sachs has rolled out its own ChatGPT-like sidekick, GS AI Assistant. Citigroup also last week announced a new leadership team to drive AI strategy for its nearly quarter-million workers worldwide.

It's important to note that these numbers do not reflect ThoughtLinks' predictions about how many jobs could be lost or created as a result of AI — rather, they look at how much of the work done by those who work in banks could be done differently thanks to the implementation of artificial intelligence.

To assess how much each banking process could be redefined, ThoughtLinks developed a framework that maps what bank employees do to nearly 5,000 individual "processes." "'Redefined' reflects substantial AI-enabled, process-level change via automation, resequencing, elimination, or redesign," the firm wrote in its report.

In an interview, Chabria said that breaking finance jobs down to their most basic components would be critical to understanding how to retrain workers in the face of the AI revolution. "Clearly, you've got to keep the level of agility," he said, "because things are going to change."

Chabria shared three examples with Business Insider of how he anticipates sectors to respond to AI-driven changes. We got a look at snapshots for commercial banking, investment banking, and wealth management. Take a look at what's already transforming, what will be adapted by 2030, and the parts of the job that may stay mostly in the hands of humans for now.

Commercial banking: 49% redefined by 2030

What's already being automated:

• First-generation banking advisor copilot services are now live, helping bankers obtain insights on clients, quickly summarize notes or files, draft basic memos, or flag policy exceptions.
• Some manual workflows — like creating spreadsheets, drafting emails, and navigating legacy systems — are being replaced. This reduces time doing manual work, as well as human error.
• Customers have access to virtual AI-enabled assistants on corporate banking systems that give them personalized insights and enable them to do routine transactions more quickly.

What is expected to be redefined by 2030:

• Client onboarding: GenAI will help guide client onboarding conversations and tailor explanations, while the next iteration of AI will likely be able to verify forms and assess risks.
• Banks will leverage AI to assess small business creditworthiness to expand credit access.
• Banks will use AI to adjust loan pricing, fee structures, and product terms based on clients' behavior, financial patterns, and market conditions.
• AI tools will help detect some breaches and generate internal alerts in real time, increasing security 24/7.

What is likely to resist being redefined by AI:

• Large corporate lending will still require human credit judgment and board oversight.
• Banks will need to rely on legal, tax, risk, and structuring teams.

Investment Banking: 33% redefined by 2030

What's already being automated:

• Drafting documents like prospectuses or pitchbooks is being digitized. Generative AI tools can now pull in some market data, past deals, financial comps, and company-branded slides to build draft pitchbooks in minutes.
• Internal AI copilots are accelerating deal prep. Bankers can now use GPT-based tools to instantly summarize earnings calls, analyst reports, and client financials.
• Generative AI tools can now review documents, flag missing disclosures, and summarize new regulatory changes.

What is expected to be redefined by 2030:

• Banks will leverage AI to simulate investor demand or model pricing scenarios for equity and debt offerings. (Final allocation will remain human-led.)
• AI will help bankers test thousands of ways to structure a deal by adjusting debt, equity, pricing, and covenants to find the right balance for clients.

What is likely to resist being redefined by AI:

• Final IPO and syndicate pricing will remain human-led. Setting the price for a new issuance will require banker judgment, market feel, and live investor feedback.
• Winning mandates and advising the C-suite will remain relationship-driven and led by humans, who will use AI to enhance their knowledge or judgment and land new mandates.

Wealth Management: 42% redefined by 2030

What's already being automated:

• AI copilots can now answer questions, generate meeting prep docs, and summarize client portfolios — in seconds.
• Financial planning is faster and becoming more scalable. Tools powered by generative AI can aid advisors in building personalized plans that simulate life events, goals, and risk tolerance without starting from scratch.
• Client reporting is now becoming personalized with custom commentary on investment performance, market moves, and risk tailored to each client's portfolio.

What is expected to be redefined by 2030:

• Tax management will become more automated and timely.
• AI will help tailor advice and investment strategies to reflect individual preferences, financial behavior, and goals.
• On the flip side, clients may use AI to manage their wealth in their own portfolio with smart triggers.

What is likely to resist being redefined by AI:

• Client engagement and coaching will remain human. During market downturns or personal events, clients still want empathy, reassurance, and value judgment that only a trusted advisor can provide.

• Regulators will ensure that advisors remain responsible for advice, not AI.

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• "28 Years Later" introduces a cult leader inspired by Jimmy Savile, a BBC star outed as a prolific abuser.
• Chi Lewis-Parry, who played an infected Alpha in the film, called the character "masterful."
• "It's hard to come up with something original," he told BI.

Fans of "28 Years Later" were divided by the ending that introduces Sir Jimmy Crystal (Jack O'Connell), a cult leader who bears more than a passing resemblance to Jimmy Savile, the BBC presenter outed as a prolific sexual abuser after his death in 2011.

In an interview with Business Insider in June, the film's respective director and producer, Danny Boyle and Alex Garland, confirmed that the character is based on Savile.

Chi Lewis-Parry, who plays Samson, a new, super-strong type of the infected called an Alpha, told BI that he thinks introducing Crystal was a bold decision but said "you have to test the boundaries."

Boyle has always challenged audiences with his films, including "28 Days Later" and "Trainspotting," a dark comedy about people in Glasgow addicted to heroin. In the world of "28 Years Later," the Rage Virus would have broken out before Savile's crimes could be unearthed. It seems likely the sequel, "The Bone Temple," will explore this further.

Lewis-Parry said: "It's hard to come up with something original" in the horror genre.

"Introducing that character is a different type of horror. It's taking real horror and sticking it in a fantasy horror scenario. I think that's masterful because you're not just relying on the jump scares and the stereotypical gore.

"You are kind of teasing the psyche of an audience with a real-life horror that has been discovered," he added. "For me, it's almost scarier because that really happened. Whatever you attach to that character is the fear element. I think it's brilliant, personally."

Boyle and Garland told BI how Crystal's scenes in "28 Years Later" set up the sequel. Garland said the bizarre cult leader taps into bigger themes of a "misremembered past" and "how selective memory is."

O'Connell will no doubt have a larger presence in the second film as Crystal, while Lewis-Parry will reprise his role as Samson.

BI previously reported how Lewis-Parry said he scared Boyle into casting him in the role during his audition.

Lewis-Parry teased that fans "might fall in love with Samson," but didn't reveal any plot points, adding: "it's magical when you watch something and know nothing about any surprises."

• Military officials and experts warn that air superiority may not be possible in modern warfare.
• Israel, however, was able to quickly achieve it against Iran.
• Iran, though capable, isn't bringing the same fight that a foe like Russia or China could.

Israel swiftly seized air superiority over parts of Iran during the latest fight, showing that it's still possible in modern, higher-end warfare to heavily dominate an enemy's skies.

But there's a risk in taking the wrong lesson from that win. Iran isn't Russia or China, and as the West readies for potential near-peer conflict, it really can't afford to forget that, officials and experts have cautioned.

Western military officials and warfare experts have repeatedly warned in recent years that achieving air superiority against those countries would be a daunting task.

Russia and China, especially the latter, boast sophisticated, integrated air defense networks with ground-based interceptors well supported by capable air forces, electronic warfare, and reliable space-based and airborne intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance.

Air superiority in a limited theater is not the same as breaking through a complex anti-access, area-denial setup.

Israel's victory in the air war over Iran shows that air superiority is "not impossible" in modern warfare, former Australian Army Maj. Gen. Mick Ryan, a warfare strategist, explained. That said, he continued, a Western conflict with Russia or China would be "very different."

A victory in the air for Israel

Israel attacked nuclear and military sites in Iran in bombing runs and eliminated dozens of Iranian air defense batteries.

Justin Bronk, an airpower expert at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), said it "highlights what you can do with a modern air force against some, on paper, fairly impressive defenses."

Iran maintained a capable layered air defense network featuring domestic systems, foreign-supplied defenses, and some modernized older systems. Though only semi-integrated compared to fully networked air defenses, it presented an obstacle.

Israel dismantled Iranian defenses over multiple engagements through extensive planning, detailed intelligence, and the employment of combat-proven airpower, specifically fifth-generation F-35 stealth fighters built for penetration and suppression of enemy air defenses and fourth-generation F-15s and F-16s, which can also support that mission.

Important to Israel's success in the latest fight with Iran were the engagements last year that substantially weakened Iranian air defense capabilities, as well as Israel's skills in this mission. Failures and aircraft losses in the 1973 Yom Kippur War led it to reevaluate how it approached enemy air defenses, in many ways leading to the emergence of the kind of missions used against Iran.

Ed Arnold, a security expert at RUSI, said that Israel reporting no aircraft losses "was significant, and it just showed that, yeah, you can get air supremacy very quickly." The caveat there is that doing so requires the right tactics, weapons, and intelligence, but even then, it is not guaranteed.

Retired Air Commodore Andrew Curtis, an airfare expert with a 35-year career in the Royal Air Force, told BI "the situation that everybody's been used to over the last 30 years is air supremacy," but when it comes to high-intensity war against a near-peer adverary, realistically, "those days are long gone."

Russia and China

Iran had air defenses, but not airpower. It's air force is largely made up of obsolete Western, Soviet, and Chinese aircraft. The ground-based surface-to-air missile batteries are more capable, but that's only one part of the defensive picture.

Curtis explained that Iran has "very little in the way of air defense aircraft, whereas of course Russia, and especially China, has stacks of them." Both Russia and China field fourth-generation-plus aircraft, as well as fifth-generation fighters.

China, in particular, has multiple fifth-gen fighters in various stages of development, and there are indications it's working on sixth-generation prototypes. By comparison, Iran's air force looks a lot like a plane museum.

But they also boast more advanced and more effective air defenses. Bronk said Russia's defenses are "better networked, more capable, more numerous, and more densely layered than Iran's." He said that if the West rolled back the SAM threat, it would likely be able to overcome Russia's air force, but China is a different story.

China has a complex integrated air defense network supported by ground-based air defenses, naval air defenses, and what Bronk characterized as "an increasingly very capable modern air force," among other capabilities. And China also has a "far greater and more sophisticated missile arsenal for striking bases" to hamstring an enemy's airpower. Additionally, it holds a strong economic position with an industrial base that is turning out high-end weapons.

China has also been tremendously increasing its number of interceptors without really expending any, unlike the US, which has been burning through interceptors in Middle Eastern conflicts.

Not all of China has the same protections, but breaking through defenses would likely represent a substantial challenge in a conflict, especially in something like a Taiwan contingency.

A conflict between the West and China could look like "a more traditional air war" — something not seen in a long time, Curtis said, explaining that air-to-air combat could make a comeback, with pilots again shooting down enemy planes. "In a peer-on-peer conflict, certainly with China, you would see a lot of that, because China has got a lot of air assets."

Future air battles

Achieving air superiority, as Israel did recently and as the US did in the Gulf War in the 1990s and in the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan in the 2000s, has been crucial to the Western way of war, often serving as a tool to enable ground maneuvers.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which failed to knock out Ukraine's air defenses, now far more robust than at the start of the war, has shown what a conflict looks like when it isn't achieved. Aircraft are shot out of the sky, and ground forces are locked in grinding slogs. Devastating long-range attacks are still possible, but quick victory is generally not.

It has resulted in some stark warnings for future warfare.

Speaking on air superiority, Gen. James Hecker, the commander of NATO's air command, warned last year that "it's not a given." He added that "if we can't get air superiority, we're going to be doing the fight that's going on in Russia and Ukraine right now."

Other military leaders have said that air superiority may only be achieved in short bursts. War is full of surprises, but evidence indicates that's a real possibility. Achieving

Curtis said air planners now have to focus on specific priorities, like protecting air bases, and figuring out how to achieve a "localized time-bound air superiority or air supremacy in support of a short-term mission or operation."

"It's a different mindset," he said.

The key in future wars will be to seize control of as much of the aerial battlespace as possible to do what's necessary in the moment, all while holding firm defensively, as Israel did against Iran's retaliatory ballistic missile strikes, experts said. That means maintaining a strong air force and strong air defenses.

"Nothing in Ukraine or Israel has shown that air superiority isn't needed in the future," Ryan shared. "I think they've both shown that having air superiority is an extraordinarily important part of warfare and remains so.

• Motherhood is challenging, especially when you have six kids.
• As my kids have grown, life hasn't gotten any easier. It's just different.
• I try to remind myself that parenting is supposed to be hard.

Some mornings, I wake up and feel like I'm already behind. Someone can't find their shoes, someone is fighting over who gets to sit in the front seat, and I'm pouring cereal into a cup because all the bowls are somehow in the dishwasher — again. And in the middle of the chaos, I catch myself thinking, "How am I still so bad at this?"

I've been a mom for nearly 20 years. I have six kids, ranging in age from a teenager down to a 1-year-old. I've homeschooled. I've worked. I've done it all with and without a support system. If experience came with a trophy, I'd probably have a shelf full of them. And yet, I still have days when I go to bed wondering if I was patient enough, present enough, or just enough.

Life doesn't get easier, it gets different

I'm in what I call the messy middle of motherhood. During this time kids aren't babies anymore, so people assume it must be easier. But it's not. It's just different.

The sleepless nights are traded for emotional exhaustion. You're no longer chasing toddlers — you're navigating curfews, attitudes, identity, and the constant tug-of-war between boundaries and independence.

Your kids you, but in ways that are harder to define. They need guidance, empathy, and snacks every 15 minutes. They need deep conversations late at night, even when you feel like you have nothing left. They need your strength when you're running on fumes.

And the whole time, you're expected to hold it all together with grace, with gratitude, and preferably without falling apart in the middle of the grocery store.

This is supposed to be hard

But here's something I'm learning: Motherhood is only hard for the ones who are trying. If you didn't care so much, it would be easy.

You wouldn't overthink your decisions or question whether your child needs therapy or just a nap. You wouldn't stay up worrying, praying, googling symptoms, or wondering if you're doing any of it right.

That weight you're carrying? That doubt? That relentless voice in your head wondering if you're failing? It exists because you care.

And that matters more than we give ourselves credit for.

Because the truth is, there's no such thing as a perfect mom. There's just a present one. A mom who shows up. A mom who keeps trying. A mom who loves deeply, messes up often, and starts over again each morning.

I know I'm not alone

If you're feeling stretched thin, emotionally worn down, or like you're somehow still not doing enough — you're not alone. Even moms with big families and years of experience can feel like they're drowning in the demands of the everyday.

But here's the good news: you're not failing. You're in the thick of it. You're living out the most important (and often overlooked) part of motherhood, the in-between years. The not-so-cute, not-so-Instagramable, fiercely formative middle.

And one day, when the house is quieter and the shoes are where they're supposed to be, you'll look back and see that all your invisible work mattered. That even when it felt like too much, you were enough.

So if today was loud and messy and imperfect — same here. We're not failing. We're mothering. And that's more than enough.

• Southern cities dominate RentCafe's top 10 list for renters in the US.
• RentCafe analyzed housing affordability, local economies, and quality of life.
• The South claims 41 of the top 50 cities, highlighting cost of living advantages.

Go South, young man.

Well, if you're a renter, you might want to at least consider it.

According to a new analysis from research firm RentCafe, the 10 best cities in the US for renters are all in southern states, such as the Carolinas, Florida, Texas, Georgia, and Alabama.

To compile the list, RentCafe considered 20 metrics across three categories: housing affordability, the attractiveness of local economies, and quality of life.

From sources like the Census Bureau and Yardi Matrix, the firm looked at stats like local unemployment rates, average apartment square footage, income growth, how many apartments in the city are new, average commute times, and more.

"The South firmly establishes itself as the top region for renters in 2025, by claiming an impressive 41 of the 50 featured cities," wrote Adina Dragos in the report. "This growing interest is reflected in the region's consistently high rankings in key categories, like cost of living and housing and local economy, with nearly all leading cities securing spots within the top 30 for these criteria."

Below are the top 10 on RentCafe's list. Each city's national housing cost of living ranking, which had a 50% weighting in RentCafe's index, is included. The average apartment square footage and the share of new apartments in the city are also shown.

10. Orlando, Florida

City's national housing cost of living rank: 17

Average apartment size: 965 square feet

Share of new apartments: 19%

9. Raleigh, North Carolina

City's national housing cost of living rank: 14

Average apartment size: 947 square feet

Share of new apartments: 21.5%

8. Round Rock, Texas

City's national housing cost of living rank: 5

Average apartment size: 915 square feet

Share of new apartments: 23.8%

7. Charleston, South Carolina

City's national housing cost of living rank: 30

Average apartment size: 974 square feet

Share of new apartments: 27.4%

6. Wilmington, North Carolina

City's national housing cost of living rank: 10

Average apartment size: 952 square feet

Share of new apartments: 28.5%

5. Huntsville, Alabama

City's national housing cost of living rank: 5

Average apartment size: 945 square feet

Share of new apartments: 27.7%

4. Austin, Texas

City's national housing cost of living rank: 13

Average apartment size: 866 square feet

Share of new apartments: 26.1%

3. Atlanta, Georgia

City's national housing cost of living rank: 9

Average apartment size: 968 square feet

Share of new apartments: 21.1%

2. Sarasota, Florida

City's national housing cost of living rank: 3

Average apartment size: 969 square feet

Share of new apartments: 39%

1. McKinney, Texas

City's national housing cost of living rank: 4

Average apartment size: 948 square feet

Share of new apartments: 33.5%

• McKinsey's global managing partner said humor and vulnerability can help employees open up.
• Bob Sternfels said he likes to take walks with small groups and participate in fun traditions.
• Sternfels said McKinsey is also continuing to focus on professional development for its staff.

What does the head of McKinsey & Company, one of the world's most prestigious consulting firms, say is essential to leading high-performing teams?

Humor.

"A little levity — a joke at your own expense, a lighthearted moment — can go a long way toward building trust, breaking down barriers, and democratizing the team room," Bob Sternfels, McKinsey's global managing partner and chair of the firm's board of directors, told Business Insider in a an email last month.

Founded in 1926, McKinsey is approaching its 100th year in business. Sternfels, who was first elected by the firm's senior partners to lead it in 2021, said that while the firm might look and sound different than when it started, its mission and values have remained.

He was reelected for a second three-year term in 2024 and heads the firm's 40,000 employees around the globe, a 10% reduction from 18 months prior.

In addition to humor, one simple tool he uses to get employees to open up when he visits the firm's offices around the world is walking.

"I like to invite small groups of colleagues on walks whenever I visit one of our offices — it's a great way to get moving and hear what's really on people's minds," he said.

He also said he likes to join in on fun traditions that colleagues invite him to, like mochi-making in Tokyo, a hot wing challenge in Phoenix, and karaoke in Manila. Participating in these activities helps set a good tone before a town hall, he said, adding, "A little vulnerability on my part helps people open up."

Sternfels is leading McKinsey as the consulting industry faces disruption brought on by AI, and the global economy faces major changes.

A spokesperson for the firm said in May that AI was driving new levels of productivity and that it planned to hire thousands of new consultants this year.

Sternfels said he's drilling down on three main issues in 2025. ("If you know anything about McKinsey consultants, you'll know we rarely have a single answer," he wrote.) They are: distinctive impact with clients, unrivaled employee development, and staying global as a firm.

He said McKinsey was committed to professional development, noting Time magazine ranked it the "best company for future leaders" two years in a row.

"We're also not shying away from continuing to build a diverse meritocracy. It doesn't matter who you are or where you're from — it only matters what you've got," he wrote.

As for what he sees as the biggest growth areas looking forward, he said many CEOs are trying to navigate shifting trade policy and supply chain issues, and that "building a musical around geopolitics" is essential for this moment.

Capturing the productivity gains of AI remains top of mind, and it's clear that just incorporating the technology won't be enough.

"Companies will have to really rewire their organizations to fully benefit," he said of AI.

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• "Love Island USA" is a game show about finding true love and testing that connection.
• Despite the premise of the show, most of the contestants have failed to make strong connections.
• They seem too preoccupied with perception, reflecting our culture of social media and surveillance.

If you want to understand how constantly carrying a camera in your pocket has affected the way we think, behave, and fall in love, watch "Love Island USA."

On Tuesday, the 26th (!!!) episode of season seven aired on Peacock, meaning the original cast members have been secluded in an open-air Fiji villa for about one month. Based on how the show typically progresses, by this time, there should be several strong connections between the islanders, couples for the viewers to root for and, eventually, to vote for as joint winners of a $100,000 cash prize.

Instead, a common refrain among viewers online is that, at this point, no one deserves the money. Calls for the producers to "cut the cameras" and "delete the whole cast" abound.

This season has made a negative impression for various reasons, chief among them being an apparent lack of sincerity. The islanders seem hyper-aware of their role as entertainers and competitors, much too preoccupied with how they're being perceived by an invisible audience to be truly honest and vulnerable with each other.

Can we blame them?

It's not only that cameras are pointed at the islanders from every angle, in every nook and cranny of the villa, during every minute of the day — it's that reality TV has reached the point where viable cast members are already accustomed to those exact conditions.

It's painfully clear that living in an age of constant surveillance has taken its toll on these twentysomethings. This season, the cast's ages have ranged from 21 (Vanna) to 29 (Zak), though most hover in the 23-27 range. Their lives have been defined by the advent and proliferation of smartphones; the rise of YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok; and with these gadgets and platforms, a new kind of celebrity known as the "influencer." These days, some genre of content creator is one of the most commonly cited dream jobs for Gen Alpha kids.

Speaking as someone who came of age in a post-9/11 world, who happily forked over my personal data to Mark Zuckerberg when I had yet to hit puberty, my generation's expectation of privacy ceased to exist pretty quickly. But when a person grows up idolizing those who found fame by broadcasting their personal lives, the value of privacy is also lost.

Meanwhile, the expectation to perform is more intense than ever. Even beyond the villa, it feels like there are spectators everywhere we go — with the way social media trends leak into real life and how people have normalized filming strangers and themselves in the hopes of going viral.

Amaya Espinal is one of the few islanders not afraid to show real emotion

Inside the villa, this expectation is dialed up to maximum levels. With the exception of Amaya Espinal — who is so raw and sincere that her willingness to express emotion has been repeatedly mocked by her castmates — the Gen Zers on "Love Island" seem to be putting up a front because they probably are; it comes as naturally to them as posing for a photo or curating a dating app profile.

This inevitably makes it difficult for the islanders to forge genuine intimacy, especially in the fires of reality TV. As April Eldemire, a licensed marriage and family therapist, previously told Business Insider's Julia Pugachevsky, vulnerability and open communication are keys to a lasting relationship. "You have to go in with open eyes," she said.

However, this doesn't necessarily make the islanders "fake." It makes them products of an environment that billionaires and tech companies created — and a tragic mirror for the rest of us.

• Jeremiah Peoples taught himself how to code while in the military after dropping out of college.
• He got to leverage his new skills at an apprenticeship in the military but felt impostor syndrome.
• Peoples overcame his doubts and landed a job at Slack after his service.

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Jeremiah Peoples, a 28-year-old staff developer advocate at Slack in Austin. It's been edited for length and clarity.

I work in software engineering as a staff developer advocate without a college degree. After my first semester in Butler University's computer science program, I dropped out and joined the military in May 2016.

While in the military, I taught myself how to code. In February 2020, I started a six-month temporary duty assignment, similar to an apprenticeship, to build satellite applications.

I was immediately reminded of how little I knew. After work, I felt terrible because I felt inadequate and thought they had made a mistake by hiring me.

I ended my enlistment in the military in May 2022 and started at Slack that same month. I've overcome that impostor syndrome.

My job in the military was as an intelligence analyst

I assessed dangers around the world in real time, trying to provide value that could be helpful to the US and military operations.

I enjoyed progressing in rank, the camaraderie, and the structure. In 2019, I volunteered to deploy to the Middle East, where I worked 12-hour shifts, seven days a week, in a war zone.

While in the Middle East, I realized this wasn't how I wanted to spend the best years of my life.

I needed a change

I started to make a plan and research other careers on YouTube. I saw a few creators who became software engineers without going to college.

I reverse-engineered what they did. I decided to study their videos, essentially do what they did, and hopefully try to achieve the same success.

I started with learning Python from a book, but after a month of working with it, I realized it wasn't the type of coding I wanted to do. I switched from learning Python to JavaScript, HTML, and CSS through an online course that I bought.

Learning to code was tough but really exciting

After my 12-hour shifts, there wasn't much to do besides work out or study. I studied every single day for three hours. I was having a good time and making progress.

I blended my background as an intelligence analyst with my ability to write code, which is how I started working on some technical coding projects in my intelligence job.

After that, I used it to land my temporary duty assignment with Section 31, an Air Force unit in Southern California tasked with creating applications for the Space Force. I was simultaneously an intelligence analyst and a software engineer.

My doubt lasted for over half of the apprenticeship

The feeling of doubt lasted for around three and a half months. It eventually clicked for me that I wasn't supposed to get it that quickly.

I grew up playing sports, and I thought of learning to code as learning sports. I had only been learning to code for about a year, and I was working alongside people who had been working in the industry for longer.

I had to realize that's OK. They're not expecting me to be a professional coder, but they want me to learn and grow. That's when I finally started to turn a corner and realize that I need to increase my reps, study, and practice like I would a sport.

Having a mentor really helped me

When I got a mentor, he streamlined everything I learned, helped me apply it, and told me what I didn't need to learn. Finding a mentor I was comfortable with and someone who had already achieved success where I wanted to achieve success was probably the most important part of my learning.

When I returned home from Iraq, I had two mentors. One was in the Air Force, a senior engineer in my squadron, and I just attached myself to him and asked him so many questions. He was so patient with me. I had another mentor who was a civilian.

I have some mentors now at Slack who are able to challenge me and help me grow.

There's not a single thing I would do differently

I'm extremely grateful and blessed to be in the position I'm in today.

In the Space Force apprenticeship, I did pair programming, which means you sit with another engineer and go back and forth. One writes the technical test, and the other writes the code to make that test pass.

Every time I heard a phrase that I didn't know in a meeting or saw a line of code that I didn't understand, I made note of it. Then, for 30 minutes every single day, I would talk to my mentor and just try to get better.

If you're feeling impostor syndrome, look in the mirror and tell yourself that the people who hired you are smart people, and they hired you for a reason.

As a staff developer advocate now, it's my job to know how to create custom applications in Slack and then teach them to all of our customers around the world with content via on-site workshops, presentations, keynotes, and virtual content.

In 2020, I started a YouTube channel

I documented my process and created content about software engineering. When I was separating from the Air Force in 2022, I put out a little teaser video on Twitter saying that I was open to work. That post went pretty viral, and I got messages about job opportunities at Google, Amazon, and Slack, where I ended up.

I don't have impostor syndrome anymore because I understand what it is. The only way to get through it is by being confident in your abilities.

I'm now confident in my abilities and what I can offer my employer and my community.

Did you land a job without a college degree? Reach out to this reporter at [email protected].

• America's Frontier Fund is raising up to $315 million for its first fund, per a pitch deck viewed by BI.
• The fund will invest $175 million in government loans and $140 million in private capital in national security startups.
• Google CEO Eric Schmidt and Founders Fund partner Peter Thiel have invested in the firm's nonprofit foundation.

A national security-focused VC fund, America's Frontier Fund, is raising a large new fund, capitalizing on the sector's support as the Trump administration rallies behind defense tech.

The firm is raising up to $315 million for its first fund, called the Frontier Fund, according to a pitch deck viewed by Business Insider. In early 2023, the target for the fund was $500 million, per an SEC filing.

The fund will consist of $140 million of private capital from limited partners and $175 million of government loans, according to the deck. The fundraise hasn't closed yet, and the terms of the deal could change. Part of the funding will come through the Small Business Investment Company Critical Technology Initiative, a program launched by the Defense Department and the Small Business Administration to grow private investment in biotech, quantum science, advanced materials, AI, space, and more.

A spokesperson for the venture firm declined to comment on the fundraise.

America's Frontier Fund will receive government-guaranteed loans, matching private investments up to $175 million. The firm will repay the loan with interest over a ten-year period, according to Washington Business Journal, which first reported the fund's government loans in 2024. The fund has also raised $100 million from the state of New Mexico, Bloomberg reported in 2023. The private capital raise has not been previously reported.

The Frontier Fund will give the Arlington, Va.-based firm fresh cash to back startups building frontier technologies — advanced manufacturing, compute solutions, energy, and other highly technical fields — that support American economic and geopolitical influence. America's Frontier Fund recently invested in Venus Aerospace, which makes hypersonic engine technology, and Foundation Alloy, a metal production startup.

$315 million is large for a first fund; market downturn, delayed initial public offerings, and more have hampered venture firm's capacity to raise large sums of money from limited partners. In 2024, 121 US-based venture capital firms raised funds for the first time, notching $5.7 billion in commitments. That year, the average size of a US-based firm's first fund was just under $41 million, over $270 million smaller than the Frontier Fund, according to data firm Pitchbook.

Investments in the defense tech space have surged up to $1.4 billion in the first quarter of 2025, compared with $200 million the same period last year, according to Pitchbook.

The firm also invests out of its Roadrunner Venture Studios, which backs pre-seed and seed stage startups building frontier tech primarily in New Mexico. Silicon Valley heavyweights like former Google CEO Eric Schmidt and Founders Fund partner Peter Thiel have invested in the firm's separate nonprofit arm, the America's Frontier Fund Foundation, an initiative to support US technological competitiveness, like partnering with the Austin Community College District on expanding its advanced manufacturing program.

Gilman Louie, the CEO of America's Frontier Fund, previously cofounded and ran In-Q-Tel, the CIA-funded investment firm. Cofounder and managing partner Jordan Blashek formerly worked at Schmidt Futures, Eric Schmidt's family office, now Schmidt Sciences, a philanthropic organization that funds research in AI, advanced computing, biotech, climate, and other industries.

• Bild AI analyzes blueprints to streamline preconstruction processes.
• The five-month-old startup raised a $3.1 million seed round led by Khosla Ventures.
• Bild estimates material costs and will eventually streamline permitting, its cofounder told BI.

A Columbia grad who was one of Google's youngest engineers and a serial entrepreneur who built hundreds of homes starting at age 16 have their sights set on disrupting the construction industry with AI.

Roop Pal and Puneet Sukhija launched construction startup Bild AI in February and on Xday announced a $3.1 million seed round led by Khosla Ventures, with participation from Mission Street Capital, Ryan Sutton-Gee, and Ooshma Garg.

Bild uses AI to read blueprints and estimate the materials and costs associated with a project. This is currently a timely and error-prone process done by hand, Pal said.

The company, which consists of just Pal and Sukhija, will use its seed to hire engineers aggressively in order to expand its technology, Pal told BI.

The duo came up with the idea for Bild at a Hack for Social Impact event in San Francisco, and were accepted into Y Combinator within days of meeting.

"I was really mostly keen on the issue of affordable housing," Pal, who also previously worked at Waymo, told BI. "There's an opportunity to apply my knowledge in computer vision and AI to really make an impact."

The startup's early clients are material suppliers in the framing, flooring, and door businesses, predominantly for multifamily residences. The company makes money by charging subscription fees.

By cutting down on presconstruction costs, Pal said Bild could also spell savings for renters. "If you have elastic housing markets," he said, "this cost passes through and people save on rent."

Material analysis is just the first layer of Bild's vision, as it incorporates new sub-trades — such as windows and roofing — one by one.

As its blueprint-reading technology becomes more sophisticated, it will ultimately be used in the permitting process, Pal said, to catch compliance issues and cut down on the costly and bureaucratic back-and-forth for residential and non-residential projects alike.

"If you reduce 1% of the cost of a hospital, that's another hospital that we have budget to build," he said. "It can really make a big difference broadly."

In addition to Bild, AI is also infiltrating other aspects of the construction industry, with firms like Shawmut and Suffolk relying on the technology to shore up worker safety.

• Zyn owner Philip Morris International US has launched a patriotic ad blitz.
• PMI wants Americans to know more about its corporate brand.
• The push comes as Zyn has soared in popularity.

The owner of buzzy nicotine pouch brand Zyn is taking over the upper deckys of several national newspapers and websites this Independence Day weekend with a patriotic push.

Sales of Zyn have soared in the past two years. The flavored nicotine pouches, placed between either the lower ("lower decky") or upper ("upper decky") lip and gum, are beloved by TikTokers and the conservative manosphere alike.

Zyn's popularity has propelled parent company Philip Morris International's stock to all-time highs. But few Americans know a great deal about Zyn's corporate owner and its US operations.

So, PMI's US division is running an ad campaign titled "Invested in America" across newspapers like The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, LinkedIn, YouTube, digital news sites including Business Insider, and selected connected TV channels.

PMI said it's hoping to reach "key opinion leaders" as it reintroduces its corporate US brand to America. It wants to raise awareness that Zyn, which was acquired by PMI from Swedish Match in 2022, is manufactured in the US, from its Kentucky facility. PMI also wants its target audience to know that the company's corporate headquarters is located in Stamford, Connecticut, and that it employs around 2,500 people nationwide.

Marian Salzman, PMI's vice president of corporate development in the US, told Business Insider that she and the company's US CEO, Stacey Kennedy, embarked on a listening tour around the US in the fall of 2023, which ultimately culminated in the "Invested in America" campaign. They found commonality around people "wanting a strong and proud America," Salzman said.

Salzman added that the campaign's ambition is to spark greater recognition of PMI's investments in healthier alternatives to smoking and its investments in US communities through job creation and charitable projects.

Patriotic campaigns follow a trend, but also carry a risk

PMI's flag-waving campaign launches in "Made in the USA" month, as designated by the Federal Trade Commission. Amid a global tariff war and President Donald Trump's push to boost domestic manufacturing, brands such as Ford and American Giant have recently shifted their US advertising to proudly promote their American roots. (Some big brands have also sought to play down their Americanness in their marketing overseas.)

PMI will need to tread carefully, said Marcus Collins, a clinical professor of marketing at the University of Michigan.

PMI's heritage is as a tobacco company — with a somewhat confusing corporate history. PMI separated from Altria Group in 2008. PMI still distributes cigarette brands like Marlboro and Chesterfield overseas, while Altria Group sells cigarette brands, including Marlboro, in the US, under the Philip Morris USA subsidiary.

PMI is attempting to shift more of its global business to smoke-free products. But while generally accepted as safer than smoking, nicotine products can still pose health risks, and there are concerns among public health advocates about the appeal of products like vapes and pouches to teens. (The majority of PMI's US sales are from non-combustible products, though it operates a cigar business it acquired in the Swedish Match deal.)

Collins said patriotism in America can carry many different meanings — from MAGA, to resistance, to the idea of capitalism at all costs, to name a few — and that brands need to be intentional about which of these groups they are targeting.

"I think the idea of, let's just grab on to Americanism and let people make their own judgment call or framing about what we mean when we say 'America' or 'patriotism' leaves you open to so much scrutiny for a brand whose products are already controversial," Collins said.

Salzman said the company's aim for the "Invested in America" campaign is to "spark an intelligent dialogue around change." She added that the company follows a strict marketing code, focusing its advertising only on adults who are of the legal age to use nicotine.

"We know that there's going to be naysayers, we know that there's going to be those who challenge this," Salzman said. "We'd really like to stay out of the political debate, and we'd really like this to be a communal debate about, if you won't quit, change."

• The AI talent wars are intensifying as companies like Meta offer salaries in the mid-six figures.
• Federal filings reveal Meta's wage ranges for researchers, engineers, and other workers.
• The highest-paid research engineer at Meta makes up to $440,000 in base salary.

Meta may be spending hundreds of millions of dollars to lure top AI talent from rivals. But how much is it paying its broader workforce of software engineers, product managers, and UX researchers?

Thanks to data from federal filings, we now have a window into the company's salary ranges during a heated moment in Silicon Valley's talent wars.

Software engineers at Meta can make up to $480,000. Machine learning roles go as high as $440,000. Even product designers and researchers routinely top $200,000.

The numbers come from filings that companies must submit to the Department of Labor when hiring foreign workers through the H-1B visa program, which allows them to bring in 85,000 specialized workers annually through a lottery system. Because tech companies typically guard their compensation details closely, these government-mandated disclosures provide a peek into actual pay scales.

The numbers reflect only annual salaries, excluding the stock options, signing bonuses, and other perks that can often double or triple total compensation packages.

The data comes amid intense competition for AI talent in Silicon Valley. Meta is reportedly offering some AI researchers compensation packages worth up to $300 million over four years as it builds out a new Superintelligence lab.

A spokesperson for Meta declined to comment.

The frenzy extends beyond tech giants. Thinking Machines Lab, the secretive AI startup founded by former OpenAI chief technology officer Mira Murati, is paying technical staff base salaries of up to $500,000 before the company has launched a single product, Business Insider reported earlier this week.

The battle has gotten personal. After Meta lured away seven OpenAI researchers, including Trapit Bansal, co-creator of the company's o1 reasoning model, OpenAI's chief research officer, Mark Chen, said in an internal memo that it felt like "someone has broken into our home."

Here's what Meta is paying across key roles, based on H-1B filings from the first quarter of 2025.

Artificial intelligence: The highest-paid research engineer at Meta makes up to $440,000.

• AI Research Scientist: $179,481 to $232,000
• Artificial Intelligence Product Marketing Manager: $220,000
• Machine Learning Engineer: $165,000 to $440,000
• Machine Learning Infrastructure Engineer: $239,723
• Machine Learning Research Scientist: $232,000
• Research Engineer: $154,840 to $400,000
• Senior Machine Learning Engineer: $232,017 to $232,266

Data: A data scientist at Meta earns as much as $270,000.

• Data Analyst: $168,000 to $204,000
• Data Analytics Manager: $223,202
• Data Engineer: $125,068 to $270,000
• Data Engineering Manager: $224,028 to $275,282
• Data Science Manager: $248,920 to $301,619
• Database Engineer: $181,000 to $240,002
• Data Science Director: $320,000
• Data Scientist: $122,760 to $270,000
• Senior Data Engineer: $189,066 to $209,720
• Senior Data Scientist: $204,541 to $227,559
• Senior Manager, Data & Analytics: $280,000

Engineering: Meta software engineers take home up to $480,000 in base salary.

• ASIC Engineer: $165,568 to $299,880
• Business Engineer: $137,000 to $228,538
• Design Engineer: $185,000 to $256,270
• Electrical Engineer: $164,000 to $255,000
• Embedded Software Engineer: $169,313 to $262,822
• Engineering Director: $352,310 to $353,042
• Engineering Manager: $246,536 to $288,767
• Front End Engineer: $177,747 to $233,495
• Hardware Engineer: $176,000 to $240,000
• Network Engineer: $115,000 to $239,237
• Quality Assurance Engineer: $189,213 to $244,000
• Security Engineer: $145,000 to $258,524
• Senior Software Engineer: $194,467 to $302,134
• Software Engineer: $120,000 to $480,000
• Software Engineering Manager: $219,978 to $328,000

Product and program management: A product manager at Meta is paid up to $314,159.

• Privacy Program Manager: $181,139 to $234,461
• Product Designer: $159,000 to $283,693
• Product Design Director: $321,538
• Product Design Manager: $267,540 to $279,594
• Product Growth Analyst: $142,000 to $206,000
• Product Management Director: $356,512
• Product Manager: $161,606 to $314,159
• Senior Product Designer: $199,932
• Senior Product Manager: $224,323
• Technical Program Manager: $164,131 to $274,596

Research: The highest-paid user experience researcher pockets up to $350,000.

• Applied Research Scientist: $214,032 to $232,000
• Hardware Specialized Research Scientist: $214,311
• Perception Research Scientist: $249,369
• Research Scientist: $167,000 to $321,101
• Research Scientist Manager: $258,524
• Senior Research Scientist: $214,032
• User Experience Researcher: $170,000 to $350,000
• UX Research Scientist Manager: $302,134
• UX Researcher: $195,000 to $292,160

• Trump proposed changes to the popular Public Service Loan Forgiveness program.
• Negotiators met to discuss the proposal for new limits on employers that qualify for PSLF.
• Some negotiators raised concerns about the education secretary's authority to determine PSLF eligibility.

The lengthy process of changing a student-loan forgiveness program for millions of public servants is underway.

President Donald Trump signed an executive order in March aimed at limiting the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program, created in 2007 to forgive student debt for government and nonprofit workers after 10 years of qualifying payments.

While it's unclear which specific organizations — and how many borrowers — could lose PSLF eligibility, the executive order signaled that organizations facilitating transgender healthcare or engaging in disability discrimination, which the administration defined as "anti-American" activities, could be on the line.

That question dominated the discussion during negotiation sessions that took place on June 30 through July 2, during which representatives of the Department of Education met with a range of stakeholders to help craft new language for PSLF.

A draft of the department's proposal to change PSLF, circulated among negotiators, shed more light on how the administration seeks to change the debt relief program. Specifically, the proposal includes revising the definition of a qualifying employer "to ensure that organizations that engage in activities that have a substantial illegal purpose" are not eligible for PSLF.

Those illegal purposes, per the proposal, include discrimination, like a violation of the federal disabilities act; violations of federal immigration law; what the department characterizes as "chemical castration or mutilation," like the use of puberty blockers or hormones to help a transgender person transition; and acts of terrorism.

The education secretary would determine if an employer has engaged in any of those activities on or after July 1, 2026. If the secretary finds any violations, payments a borrower made toward PSLF while working for the ineligible employer would not count.

Some of the negotiators on the committee expressed concerns with making changes to the PSLF eligibility criteria.

"I don't see where the secretary has the authority to remove the employer eligibility definition," Betsy Mayotte, the president of The Institute of Student Loan Advisors and a representative of student-loan borrowers, said during a session. She added that "these jobs are essential to the communities that they serve. So the intent of Congress was not to narrow the eligibility. It was to make it as expansive as possible under the statute that they wrote."

Jacob Lallo, a general attorney with the Department of Education, said that "there is broad rulemaking power for the secretary to promulgate regulations that interpret statutes. That is a long-standing part of American agency and administrative law."

While negotiations have concluded, the committee ultimately did not reach consensus, and any changes will take time to become finalized. As the Department of Education works on the final text to amend PSLF, there will be more opportunities for public comment.

"I'm proud that the committee members representing institutions of higher education, veterans, taxpayers, borrowers, and the business community have helped fulfill one of President Trump's promises to ensure that PSLF does not subsidize organizations that are breaking the law," Acting Under Secretary of Education James Bergeron said in a statement.

'Borrowers organized entire careers around this promise'

Some negotiators raised the alarm on establishing new definitions in areas that are not directly related to student loans, like the clause seeking to include the use of puberty blockers as an example of chemical castration.

"I don't think that the folks assembled to be part of this rulemaking were assembled for their medical expertise," Abby Shafroth, a representative from the Student Loan Borrower Assistance Project, said. "I think we're here with student loan expertise, and so I would feel very uncomfortable setting a new legal definition for these medical terms."

Negotiators on behalf of the Department of Education maintained that the intent of limiting PSLF is not to completely overhaul the program; it's to ensure that those participating in the program have employers who are delivering a public service to the American public. The proposal would also allow employers that the secretary determines to be ineligible for PSLF to respond to and challenge the department's findings before a final decision.

Trump's original executive order said that PSLF has previously "misdirected tax dollars into activist organizations that not only fail to serve the public interest, but actually harm our national security and American values, sometimes through criminal means."

It did not provide specific examples of those activities, leaving some borrowers who rely on the program on edge. One borrower advocate, who spoke during the public comment period of negotiations, said that "people are paralyzed by anxiety because rules keep shifting."

"Borrowers organized entire careers around this promise, and now they live in constant fear of the next change," she said. "The currently proposed barriers will do little to stop wrongdoing, but will create enormous administrative burden."

Borrowers who rely on the program previously told Business Insider that any change to the program puts the relief they are depending on at risk.

"I'm so close to the finish line," Jeff Hughes, a public service worker enrolled in PSLF, said. "I really hope that the program continues as is because we need some more good people out there doing good work."

• Zohran Mamdani is running for mayor in NYC on a few key policies, including free public buses.
• Fare-free buses could increase ridership and reduce driver assaults, as seen in NYC's pilot.
• But funding challenges and political hurdles lie ahead.

New York City's Democratic nominee for mayor, Zohran Mamdani, is running on some eye-catching promises. One of them is free public buses.

Mamdani argues that ending fees on buses, whose 2 million daily riders are disproportionately low-income, would allow the system to move more people — and more quickly, while relieving financial strain on the neediest.

It's a controversial proposal with a tricky political path to implementation, one that a few US cities, such as Boston and Kansas City, have tried.

Mamdani and other proponents point to New York City's recent yearlong free bus pilot, which he pushed for as a state legislator, in which one route in each of the five boroughs exempted all riders from the normal $2.90 fare.

The experiment resulted in a 30% increase in weekday riders and a 38% increase in weekend riders on the free buses, although many of these riders simply shifted from paid to unpaid routes. There was also a nearly 40% reduction in assaults on bus drivers, altercations that often stem from a dispute over fare evasion, according to an MTA report.

Meanwhile, critics say making all of the city's buses free — to the tune of about $700 million a year — isn't financially feasible or the best use of taxpayer money.

How other US cities have fared without fares

Kansas City was the first major metro in the US to fully support free fares in 2019, with Boston following in 2022 with a few prominent routes eliminating fees. Some smaller cities, like Alexandria, Virginia, and Tucson, Arizona, have also implemented free bus rides, but not at the scale of Mamdani's plan.

In Kansas City, reports of safety and security incidents dropped by 39% in the first year of zero-fare rides. Riders in Boston also saved, on average, $35 a month through the first year of implementation, according to a press release from the Boston Transportation Department.

Kansas City bus riders like Joy Mart, a 28-year-old software engineer, told Business Insider the program is essential, especially for those looking for a job or on a fixed income. Mart lost their job a few years ago, and said that as a newcomer to Kansas City, the free buses helped them tremendously.

"It was just so helpful, since you know, we're counting pennies at that point," Mart said. Riders previously paid $50 for a monthly pass or $1.50 per ride.

Mart is a leader with Sunrise Movement KC, an activist group that advocates for economic, climate, and racial justice. The group also supports and is petitioning for zero-fare buses at a time when some of its critics' biggest concerns are playing out. Due to budget shortfalls, Kansas City Mayor Quinton Lucas and the City Council approved reimplementing $2 fares to avoid major service cuts and driver layoffs. While the city already funded free buses for the next six months, after this period, the City Council will either rescind its plans or move forward with cutting services and bringing back fares.

Indeed, funding remains the largest hurdle for many cities. Kansas City residents already pay for the free bus system through a sales tax reallocation. The ⅜-cent sales tax funded about 30% of the free bus fare program and will continue through 2034, according to the Kansas City Area Transportation Authority.

In New York, the mayor doesn't have control over the MTA, which is a state agency, but Mamdani has said he hopes to partially fund the program in part by collecting overdue fines on landlords. A spokesperson for the Mamdani campaign didn't immediately return BI's request for comment.

The MTA is already juggling a slew of urgent priorities, including desperately needed large-scale infrastructure improvement projects. Without a sustainable funding source, the program won't deliver what it promises, Zhan Guo, a professor of urban planning and transportation policy at NYU, told Business Insider. But Guo also wants to see more evidence that free buses would be more reliable and efficient than the current system.

"This idea is very appealing to the general public, but I also feel there are actually many other options we haven't fully explored or utilized," he said.

Guo thinks a Mamdani administration would be wise to start by expanding on the pilot program to test the waters. Regardless of whether Mamdani fulfills his key campaign promise, Guo said, it's a "very good time to talk about fare policy."

"I like the fact that public transit, bus fares, such a very technical topic, became so visible in the mayor's campaign," Guo said. "This is actually a wonderful opportunity to engage the public."

Helping low-income New Yorkers

Proponents of free buses point to a slew of potential upsides to the policy. For one, buses tend to serve neighborhoods with poor access to trains and low-income populations who could spend their savings from bus fares on other essentials.

Low-income New Yorkers are already eligible for half-price bus and subway fares through the MTA's Fair Fares program. But only about 38% of eligible people use the program. At the same time, nearly half of riders evade bus fares, costing the Metropolitan Transportation Authority — the state agency that runs the city's subways and buses — hundreds of millions of dollars a year.

The equipment and personnel needed to collect fares are costly, too. Mamdani has pointed to the Staten Island Ferry, which has been free to ride for the last nearly 20 years, as an example of fare-free transit, which was made that way in part because collecting fares was too expensive.

Mamdani and other supporters of the policy argue that buses can board passengers more efficiently without fares, keeping them on time and moving quickly while reducing conflict between bus drivers and riders evading the fare.

"Some people see a tension between fast and free buses, but we shouldn't have to choose," Danny Pearlstein, a spokesman for the grassroots transit group Riders Alliance, told Business Insider. "We should be able to have both buses that move and buses that people can afford and that are worth paying for, even if not everyone or no one has to pay for them."

• President Donald Trump has announced a trade deal with Vietnam.
• He lowered tariffs on Vietnam to 20% but is slapping 40% tariffs on transshipments through the country.
• Vietnam has benefited from supply-chain shifts due to US-China trade tensions.

President Donald Trump just gave Vietnam a trade break — and used it to squeeze China.

On Wednesday, Trump announced a trade deal with Hanoi that would levy 20% on imports from Vietnam, down from the 46% rate Trump announced on "Liberation Day." In return, Vietnam has agreed to allow American goods to enter the country duty-free.

What's also significant is that Trump announced a 40% tariff on goods shipped from another country via Vietnam to the US — a move that analysts say is aimed squarely at transshipments from China.

"The 'China quotient' in US negotiations with other Asian economies is arguably evident in the deal with Vietnam," wrote Vishnu Varathan, Mizuho's macro research head for Asia, excluding Japan, in a Thursday note.

"The US's intent is quite obviously to not disincentivize Vietnam's role as a substitute for China at a lower 20% tariff," he added.

Vietnam has benefited from global supply-chain shifts away from China since Trump's initial trade war during his first term. In response to those tariffs, many multinational companies, including Chinese firms, moved manufacturing operations to lower-cost hubs like Vietnam to sidestep US duties.

Last year, the US ran a $123.5 billion trade deficit with Vietnam, making it America's third-largest trade gap after China and Mexico, according to the US Trade Representative's office.

A model for future trade deals?

The move follows a temporary truce between Washington and Beijing in May, when both sides agreed to a 90-day pause in their tariff war. The US slashed duties on Chinese goods from 145% to 30%, while China lowered its tariffs on American imports from 125% to 10%.

Still, the transshipment tariff on Vietnam underscores the Trump administration's effort to close the backdoor for Chinese exporters seeking loopholes into the US market.

"A tariff framework that targets transshipment while preserving the potential benefits of efficient cross-border commerce is a smart move— and a model for future trade deals — if enforced transparently and paired with clear rules of origin," wrote Eli Clemens, a policy analyst at Washington-based Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a nonpartisan research institute, on Wednesday.

The move also shows that Washington can stop Chinese supply chains from extending themselves into Southeast Asia.

"Future trade negotiations should also include targeted transshipment deterrents that level the playing field for US manufacturers and retailers," Clemens wrote.

Asia in a bind

Washington's focus on transshipment enforcement puts pressure on other Asian economies, which may find themselves forced to choose sides.

"It would be remiss to ignore this critical pillar of US trade deals with the rest of Asia, which is trained on undermining China's economic reach and influence," wrote Varathan.

The deal may also reinforce Beijing's view that US trade negotiations lacks "good faith." It could prompt retaliation — not just against the US, but also against Asian economies seen as siding with Washington.

"Other Asian economies will be particularly vulnerable to a two-sided geoeconomic squeeze given that their reliance on both China and US are significant," Varathan added.

Despite reservations about the deal, it still excited investors.

The S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite soared to record highs on Wednesday, and US stock futures are extending gains early on Thursday.

Vietnam's widely followed VN-Index also rose to its highest level since April 2022.

• Ukraine's air force released footage of its Raven missile systems downing Russian drones.
• The system uses an air-to-air missile that the UK tweaked in four months to fire from a 6×6 Supacat.
• The UK says the Raven missile system has a success rate of 70% out of 400 engagements.

Ukraine's air force released footage on Wednesday of UK-made Raven air defenses striking Russian air targets in at least five instances.

The video features a Ukrainian air defense crew discussing their experiences with the system, and their interviews are interspersed with clips of the missile soaring into the sky to destroy Russian drones.

The Raven fires what was originally the British Advanced Short Range Air-to-Air Missile, also known as the AIM-132, which is mainly equipped on the Royal Air Force's Typhoon and F-35 Lightning II fighter aircraft.

However, the UK's defense ministry said in 2022 that it had transformed the missile into a version for Ukraine that could fire from a British 6×6 HMT600 Supacat transport vehicle. At the time, it was touted as a key way for Ukraine to defend itself from Russian missile strikes.

The Asraam is particularly useful because it's infrared-guided and locks onto its target once launched, even in poor weather. Ground crews can fire it and relocate quickly, and they don't need to maintain a line of sight with their target.

UK defense officials said in 2023 that their teams took roughly four months to make the missile ground-launched and to train Ukrainian crews to use the Raven.

However, in an official video published in May, Col. Olly Todd of the UK's task force supporting Ukraine said the Raven "went from concept to delivery" within three months.

"They've conducted over 400 engagements, which understand with a success rate of over 70%," Todd said.

The Supacats are fitted with missile mounts taken from decommissioned UK jets, such as the BAE Hawk, SEPECAT Jaguar, and Panavia Tornado. These are classes of fighter aircraft that were retired from combat over the last two decades.

Crews inside use a gamepad controller to identify targets on a screen and activate the missile's infrared lock-on system.

With drones saturating the skies over Ukraine, Raven crews said in the Wednesday video that they've largely been targeting uncrewed systems, plastering their Supacat with stickers of Russian Orlan, Shahed, and Zala drones to mark every kill they scored.

The Raven's launch controls feature four switches that prepare each mounted missile and a large red button for firing.

A Ukrainian Raven operator speaking to the camera said crews are generally trained so all members, including the driver and commander, can replace each other if needed.

According to a June statement by the UK's defense ministry, Ukraine has been supplied with eight Raven systems and is due to receive another five.

The UK says that the Asraam missiles supplied to Ukraine were sitting in its inventory but were due to expire, meaning they'd have soon been marked for disposal if not sent to Kyiv.

Ukraine deploys other air defense systems similar to the Raven because they combine a hybrid mix of munitions and launchers originally built for separate systems.

Known colloquially as "FrankenSAMs," they include modified Soviet-era Buk M1s that can fire the American RIM-7 Sea Sparrow missile, as well as Soviet radars that pair with the AIM-9M Sidewinder air-to-air missile.

• Meta is training custom AI chatbots to send unprompted follow-up messages and boost user engagement.
• Contractors at Alignerr help develop bots that remember chats and personalize replies on Meta apps.
• Mark Zuckerberg has said AI companions are a potential fix for the "loneliness epidemic."

It's the AI equivalent of a double text.

Business Insider has learned Meta is training customizable chatbots to be more proactive and message users unprompted to follow up on past conversations.

It may not cure what Mark Zuckerberg calls the "loneliness epidemic," but Meta hopes it will help keep users coming back to its AI Studio platform, documents obtained by BI reveal.

The goal of the training project, known internally to data labeling firm Alignerr as "Project Omni," is to "provide value for users and ultimately help to improve re-engagement and user retention," the guidelines say.

Meta told BI that the proactive feature is intended for bots made on Meta's AI Studio, which can be accessed on its own standalone platform or through Instagram. AI Studio first rolled out in summer 2024 as a no-code platform where anyone can build custom chatbots and digital personas with unique personalities and memories.

The guidelines from Alignerr lay out how one example persona, dubbed "The Maestro of Movie Magic," would send a proactive message:

"I hope you're having a harmonious day! I wanted to check in and see if you've discovered any new favorite soundtracks or composers recently. Or perhaps you'd like some recommendations for your next movie night? Let me know, and I'll be happy to help!"

"Like many companies, we're testing follow-up messaging with AIs in Meta's AI Studio," a Meta spokesperson said in a statement to BI. "After you initiate a conversation, AIs in Meta AI Studio can follow up with you to share ideas or ask additional questions. This allows you to continue exploring topics of interest and engage in more meaningful conversations with the AIs across our apps."

Alignerr did not respond to a request for comment.

How the follow-ups work

Users can create highly personal chatbots, like a chef that suggests recipes or an interior designer that gives decor advice. For creators and influencers, the bots can handle fan interactions and respond to messages across Meta's platforms.

Meta's spokesperson added that the AI will only send a follow-up message after a user initiates a conversation, and it will not continue to contact the user if there's no response to that first follow-up. The window for any follow-up message is capped at 14 days after the initial user message. To be eligible for proactive follow-up, a user must have sent at least five messages to the chatbot in the last 14 days.

The bots made on AI Studio can be kept private for personal use or shared through stories, direct links, and even displayed on a user's Facebook or Instagram profile, the Meta AI Studio website says.

Making the bots more proactive aligns with Zuckerberg's ambitions for AI at Meta. On recent podcasts, the Meta CEO has said the average American now has fewer than three close friends and that digital agents could help fill the gap.

There's also a business reason for friendlier, proactive bots. Retention is key for generative AI companies with user-facing chatbots, and the longer users spend with a chatbot, the more valuable those interactions become, similar to engagement on social media. According to court documents that were unsealed in April, Meta predicted that its generative AI products would rake in $2 billion to $3 billion in revenue in 2025.

Some features described in Alignerr's training guidelines are already being quietly tested, while others appear to be in early rollout or pilot stages. Meta did not specify which features are live to BI.

The proactive features are similar to those of Character.AI, a startup that launched a service in 2022 that lets users create and interact with their favorite AI-powered characters or celebrities.

'It’s all about attention to detail'

Using an internal Meta review tool called SRT, freelancers simulate extended conversations with the bots, rate proactive follow-up messages, and sometimes rewrite text that falls short of Meta’s guidelines, two Alignerr contractors told BI.

A freelancer based in India who worked on Omni told BI it’s “a long-term project” with a focus on making Meta’s AI feel more personal and context-aware. “They’re very focused on personalizing information — how the AI chatbot interacts based on conversation history,” the contractor said.

“Each agent had a specific description, so you had to tailor each task to fit that persona. Again, it’s all about attention to detail,” the freelancer said. Personas could range from a doctor to a Gen Z hip-hop commentator.

Bots are expected to reference details from earlier chats, maintain their assigned persona, and keep the interaction on-topic.

Each message should align with the AI’s personality, match the previous context of the conversation, and "provide positive experiences," while explicitly avoiding anything Meta deems sensitive or harmful content.

The best messages, according to the training document, reference something concrete from the user’s past conversations.

According to the training documents, all proactive messages must comply with Meta’s broader Content and Responsibility Standards, avoiding controversy, misinformation, or emotionally heavy topics — unless the user brings them up first.

Have a tip? Contact Effie Webb via email at [email protected] or Signal at efw.40. Contact Shubhangi Goel via email at [email protected] or Signal at shuby.85. Use a personal email address and a nonwork device; here's our guide to sharing information securely.

• Charlize Theron, who adopted her daughters in 2012 and 2015, says she enjoys being a single mother.
• Her self-awareness and her parents' toxic relationship shaped her decision to raise kids on her own.
• "I can only tell you that this is the best way that I know how to be a mother to them," she said.

Charlize Theron, 49, has zero regrets about doing motherhood solo.

During an appearance on Wednesday's episode of "Call Her Daddy," Theron spoke about her life as a single mother of two. She adopted her daughters Jackson and August in 2012 and 2015, respectively.

The "Mad Max: Fury Road" actor told podcast host Alex Cooper that her parents' relationship was a "cautionary tale" that helped her realize she didn't want to be in one. Theron was 15 when she witnessed her mother fatally shoot her alcoholic father in self-defense.

Theron said it was a "layered and complicated" decision driven by two factors: not wanting what her parents had and recognizing that she "did not have the capability of being healthy in a relationship."

"Those two things I had to acknowledge when I decided to be a parent, and I think it's probably one of the healthiest decisions I ever made," she said.

However, she acknowledges that there's still a stigma being placed on women who choose to be single.

"With women, it's always like, something must be wrong with her. She can't keep a man. And it's never part of the discussion of like, 'Wow, she's really living her truth. She's living in her happiness. This is actually a choice that she made,'" Theron said.

"I want to look at them, and just be like, 'Do you know how fucking great it is to live exactly how I want to live?' To experience motherhood exactly how I wanted to experience it," she added.

Theron says some people might question whether her decision was fair to her children, but in the end, only they can speak to their own experience.

"I can only tell you that this is the best way that I know how to be a mother to them," she said.

"I love every single day of it. I love that I don't have to share them with somebody. I love that I don't have to run every fucking thing by a guy," she added.

Theron said she "broke the cycle" by knowing exactly what she didn't want in a relationship and what she had to offer.

"And who I am at the time that I wanted to be a parent was not somebody who should be having kids with another person," Theron said.

Theron isn't the only celebrity who has spoken about being a single parent.

Lucy Liu told The Cut in 2023 that the decision to have a child in her late 40s via surrogacy — as a single woman — was largely unplanned. "I didn't do a lot of research, I just pulled the trigger," Liu said.

In a March interview with Parade, Connie Britton — who adopted her son from Ethiopia as a single woman at 45 — said she always wanted to be a mother.

"I knew that I hadn't achieved the kind of partnership that I was looking for to have a spouse and a child together. And so I thought, 'This is the time, I'm going to start the adoption process,'" Britton said.

A representative for Theron did not immediately respond to a request for comment sent by Business Insider outside regular hours.

• The Trump-Jerome Powell feud continues, this time with Trump calling on Powell to resign immediately.
• Trump amplified calls for Congress to investigate Powell on the Fed's headquarters renovation.
• Trump previously said Powell's "termination cannot come fast enough."

President Donald Trump's long-standing feud with Fed Chair Jerome Powell burns on, this time with him calling on Powell to resign immediately.

In a Wednesday night Truth Social post, the president said, "'Too Late' should resign immediately!!!"

"Too Late" is his nickname for the top banker, a criticism of Powell's refusal to lower interest rates.

In his post, Trump included a headline from a Wednesday Bloomberg article about Bill Pulte, the head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency, calling on Congress to investigate Powell.

In a Wednesday post on X, Pulte said Congress should investigate Powell over the central bank's headquarters renovation plans.

"I am asking Congress to investigate Chairman Jerome Powell, his political bias, and his deceptive Senate testimony, which is enough to be removed 'for cause,'" Pulte wrote in his statement on X.

Trump's animosity with Powell stretches back to his first term in office — he accused the Fed in 2019 of holding the stock market back.

Later that year, he said in an interview on the Fox Business Network that Powell was not doing a good job.

In 2020, Trump said he had the right to remove Powell as Fed chair, to "put him in a regular position and put somebody else in charge."

This April, Trump kicked off his criticism of Powell again, saying on Truth Social that Powell's "termination cannot come fast enough."

Trump has reportedly been weighing replacements for Powell, whose term ends in May 2026. The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Trump plans to float a replacement as soon as September or October.

Representatives for Trump and the Federal Reserve did not respond to requests for comment from Business Insider.

• BYD is halting Mexico factory plans over US trade policy concerns.
• US tariffs on Mexico-made cars are affecting automakers including Nissan and Stellantis.
• BYD is opening a factory in Brazil, its first outside Asia.

The world's largest electric vehicle maker is halting plans to build a major factory in Mexico due to concerns about US trade policies.

On Wednesday, BYD said that the company still plans to expand further into North or South America, but it does not have a timeline for the plan.

"Geopolitical issues have a big impact on the automotive industry," Stella Li, an executive vice president, said in an interview with Bloomberg. "Now everybody is rethinking their strategy in other countries. We want to wait for more clarity before making our decision."

In September, Bloomberg reported that the EV giant would not announce a major plant investment in Mexico until after the US election. In March, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said BYD had not made a formal offer to invest in the country.

President Donald Trump's tariffs have been a big pain point for US and global automakers. Cars coming from Mexico to the US remain subject to a 25% tariff.

Car manufacturers have responded in various ways, from offering discounts to shoppers who hope to avoid future price hikes to adding import fees on vehicles built outside the US. Some producers, like Stellantis and Nissan, have cut back on Mexico-based production.

In the region, BYD is opening a plant in the Brazilian state of Bahia, the company's first factory outside Asia.

In December, Brazilian authorities halted the construction of BYD factory and sued the company, saying that construction workers lived in slavery-like conditions. Over 160 workers had been rescued from the working conditions, according to a statement from a Brazilian labour authority.

The statement said that workers were put in "degrading" conditions and had their passports and salaries withheld by a service provider for BYD.

At the time, BYD said affected workers had been moved to hotels. It added that it had conducted a "detailed review" of the working and living conditions for subcontracted employees and asked on "several occasions" for the construction firm to make improvements.

On Wednesday, Li said the episode prompted the company to reassess its approach to international expansion.

"We should slow down, step back from the focus on speed. We need to work more with local companies," she said. "It will take longer, but that's OK."

Chinese players, including BYD, Xiaomi, Nio, and Xpeng, have been undercutting Tesla's prices and gaining market share in China and Europe. BYD is on track to sell more than 5 million cars this year, and the company sold more EVs than Tesla in Europe for the first time in April.

BYD stock is up 38% so far this year because of strong battery technology, its affordability, and global expansion.