Halfway through Shift: founders are already building their first AI agents

Just a few weeks ago, we welcomed 60 small business founders from London and Berlin to the first cohort of Shift.

Powered by INCO and made possible by PayPal, the programme helps SMEs build practical AI skills and apply them to real business challenges, and the programme comes at a time when many small businesses are actively exploring how AI can support their growth. 

Our recent research found that while many founders are already using AI in some capacity, most are looking for practical guidance on how to integrate it more meaningfully into their businesses.Now, halfway through the programme, we're already seeing founders put those ideas into practice.

Meet the Cohort 

Our cohort represents a diverse mix of businesses across education, professional services, social enterprise, technology and more. Before the programme began, one theme emerged consistently in our baseline survey: while many founders had already started experimenting with AI, most were applying it to simple, everyday tasks rather than integrating it into their wider business operations. 

74% of founders in the cohort told us they were already using AI daily, most commonly for writing and editing content, brainstorming ideas and supporting marketing activities. However, very few had explored how AI could streamline operational workflows, automate repetitive tasks or support day-to-day business processes.

That's exactly the gap Shift is designed to bridge: helping founders move beyond experimentation and start applying AI in practical ways that create lasting value for their businesses.

What we’ve been working on

Working alongside our expert partner, Niya AI, founders have been identifying repetitive tasks, mapping existing business processes and designing their first AI agents - always starting with a real business challenge rather than the technology itself.

The use cases vary widely. Some founders are exploring how AI could streamline partner outreach, while others are focusing on client onboarding, customer enquiries, marketing or reducing repetitive administrative work. Although the solutions look different, the objective is the same: creating more capacity to focus on the work that matters most.

The value of this approach is that there is no single "right" AI solution - each founder is building something that reflects the realities of their own business.

For Marit, co-founder of re:gen, an AI-powered platform helping to scale regenerative agroforestry by making complex ecosystem design more accessible, that means exploring how AI can help build smarter internal systems while she focuses on scaling her mission-driven work.

Like many founders, Marit spends a significant amount of time following up after meetings—capturing notes, assigning actions, updating project management tools and making sure nothing falls through the cracks.

Through Shift, she's designing an AI agent to support this process. Rather than replacing decision-making, the agent is designed to transcribe and summarise meetings, draft follow-up actions, organise tasks and prepare communications, while leaving Marit in control of reviewing priorities, assigning responsibilities and making the final decisions

It's a practical example of how founders are identifying everyday business processes where AI can reduce administrative workload and create more time to focus on strategic work.

"I joined Shift to make sure our internal operations at re:gen are as lean and AI-enabled as the solutions we're designing for the planet. The programme has given me practical exposure to no-code, agentic AI tools that can streamline our team workflows from day one. By putting that infrastructure in place now, we can spend less time on manual processes and more time focused on creating measurable ecological impact.”

Looking Ahead

The second half of the programme will focus on turning these ideas into working solutions as founders continue building, testing and refining their AI agents.

Alongside expert-led sessions, peer learning and an upcoming in-person event, founders will continue sharing ideas, learning from one another and exploring how AI can create meaningful value for their businesses.

As the first Shift cohort progresses, we're also continuing to learn. The experiences, challenges and successes emerging from the programme will help contribute to a growing understanding of what practical AI adoption looks like for small businesses.

We're looking forward to sharing more founder stories as the programme continues.