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Gina Jaguttis came to Bali to improve her surfing and left with a newly launched side hustle.Gina JaguttisGina Jaguttis launched a slow fashion workwear brand after being inspired at a surf camp.Her business idea came from personal struggles finding quality professional clothing.She said she realized that if the business fails, it would at least make a good story.On a Monday morning in early December, I met Gina Jaguttis as we loaded our surfboards into the camp van just before sunrise. We only got to talking on a choppy boat ride that took us a mile off the coast of Bali, Indonesia.The 26-year-old real estate project manager from Munich came to the surf camp to improve her skills on the water. I came to talk with adventurous travelers about their big ideas, from new businesses to life after layoffs.At our camp's bonfire that night, she began to tell me why she made a second solo expedition to the tropical island. As we toasted marshmallows, she shared that she had launched a small side hustle a day before the bonfire.A few weeks after we got home, both recovering from sunburns and surf injuries, we unpacked her story further in a call. Our chats have been edited for length and clarity; the following is in Jaguttis' words.When I started my career a few years ago, I struggled to find formal clothes that looked professional and were good quality. Brands like Zara or Mango didn't meet my longevity standards, and I didn't love how they are mass-produced. Construction and real estate are male-dominated, and I always wanted to look well-dressed so others know that they have to treat me professionally.In college, I was the girl who had a capsule wardrobe with pieces such as turtlenecks and cotton pants that I knew looked stylish then but also 10 years later. When I started work, it was frustrating to find well-fitted suits or blouses that were timeless and would last several years. On a trip to Bali and Thailand in 2024, I decided to invest in workwear and got a few pieces custom-made at a tailor's shop. I created vision boards, selected high-quality fabrics, and had some classic pieces made. I finally felt like I had outfits that made me feel confident in front of manager and director-level people.Once I started wearing these suits back home, people asked me where I bought them from and were surprised to hear that I designed them myself. One woman said that if I ever turned it into a business, she would definitely be up for buying from me.When I heard this for a second time, I started thinking about building my own brand.'It would make a good story'Jaguttis flew to Bali for a second time in 2025 to improve her surfing skills.Gina JaguttisStarting a business, especially one that I would fund entirely with my own savings, is always a daunting prospect. The biggest thought holding me back was "Am I going to fail?"In late November 2025, about a year after my first trip, I went to Bali again, this time to learn how to surf. I stayed at a surf camp and was surrounded by inspiring people from all over the world.It was a reflective retreat for most of them, and many were there to figure out what they wanted out of life. I met people who took all kinds of risks: musicians who stuck to their passion even when they struggled to find a job, people in between career changes, or someone living out of a van while she figured out her life plan.Talking to them made me realize that I actually knew what I wanted, and it made me think about what was really holding me back. They told me that if I fail, it would be a good story.I launched my company's Instagram that day. This is the second installment of "Beyond the break," for which Business Insider's Shubhangi Goel attended a surf camp in Bali, Indonesia, reporting on career breaks and adventure sports.Read the first: My manager and I got laid off, so we packed up our wetsuits and went to surf camp in Bali I'm not in a rushIt's been a few weeks since I was at the surf camp and launched my business.…

OpenAI CFO Sarah FriarPATRICK T. FALLON/AFP via Getty ImagesOpenAI is focused on "practical adoption" in 2026, CFO Sarah Friar wrote.The company sees opportunities to grow its business in health, science, and enterprise, she said.OpenAI generated more than $20 billion in annualized revenue in 2025, CFO noted.OpenAI is going on all in on "practical adoption" of artificial intelligence in 2026, according to its CFO."The priority is closing the gap between what AI now makes possible and how people, companies, and countries are using it day to day," Sarah Friar wrote in a recent blog post."The opportunity is large and immediate, especially in health, science, and enterprise, where better intelligence translates directly into better outcomes," she added.There are signs the startup is already taking advantage of these opportunities. Data from Ramp showed that business spending on OpenAI models surged to a record in December, outpacing rivals Anthropic and Google.Still, some investors and analysts are concerned about OpenAI's huge financial commitments and whether the startup will generate enough revenue to make a profit in future years. For example, OpenAI has announced roughly $1.4 trillion in infrastructure deals, such as data centers, in the past year or so.One potential source of new revenue is advertising, something that OpenAI said on Friday it would start testing. CEO Sam Altman once labeled ads a "last resort," although the move has been expected for months now.Friar addressed concern about OpenAI's finances in her recent blog, noting that revenue has grown in sync with compute availability.OpenAI's compute expanded from 0.2 gigawatts in 2023 to about 1.9 GW last year. Meanwhile, annualized revenue grew from $2 billion to more than $20 billion in the same period, Friar disclosed.That represents "never-before-seen growth at such scale," Friar wrote. "And we firmly believe that more compute in these periods would have led to faster customer adoption and monetization," she added.This did little to quell the critics.On Monday, tech blogger Paul Kedrosky reacted to Friar's blog post by saying: "Amusing reading from OpenAI CFO bragging that they are successfully selling dollars for $0.70 in huge volume."Read the original article on Business Insider

Hady KfouryNAYAHady Kfoury grew Naya from a single restaurant to a fast-casual chain with more than 40 locations.Kfoury's experience has shown him there are several common misconceptions about the industry.He said running a fast-casual spot is harder than you'd think and that it's not just about the food.This is an as-told-to essay based on a conversation with Hady Kfoury, the founder of Naya, a fast-casual Lebanese-inspired food chain with more than 40 locations on the East Coast. Naya plans to have 200 locations nationwide by 2030. This story has been edited for length and clarity.I studied hospitality in Switzerland and then came to New York to work under celebrity chefs, Daniel Boulud and François Payard, so I had experience in fine dining. When I decided to open the first Naya in 2008, that was more or less my comfort zone.A week after we launched, we got an amazing article in the New York Times and then we were packed for lunch and dinner. It definitely helped prevent us from shutting down after a few months.A couple of years in, we realized the food worked incredibly well in a faster and more accessible format. If you go to a Lebanese restaurant, you have all these mezze in the middle of the table, like a plate with a variety of dips and vegetables, and you're putting scoops on your plate. That's how we eat usually. So that's why I shifted my focus into a fast-casual model.Today, we have 44 restaurants and we are riding the wave of Middle Eastern and Mediterranean cuisine in general. It's definitely become mainstream, which is totally different than almost 20 years ago when I started the business.As we scale, I've found there are four major misconceptions about the restaurant business.1. Fast casual is not easyA lot of people think fast-casual restaurants are easy. It is not easy. Serving more guests at a faster pace doesn't mean it's a simple effort; it means you should master your systems and consistency at scale, possibly even more rigor than in fine dining.The biggest challenge we have is that you're on an assembly line. You're not cooking per order. It's a problem for any restaurant with a service line. How do you plan to rotate food in a certain way, and to cook it a certain amount, so the food remains fresh and not overcooked?My R&D doesn't stop. It keeps me up at night thinking about how we can keep improving what we do. And any change you make to improve something, you're rolling it out at 44 restaurants, so you have to be very mindful and careful.2. Expansion doesn't mean successGrowing only works when the business fundamentals — training, supply chain, quality control — are built to handle it repeatedly. Growing without readiness is chaotic.From 2008 to 2020, I grew Naya to seven restaurants without any partners because all I cared about was being profitable and having a great team in place. Growth only works when you have those fundamentals. In 2020, I partnered with a private-equity firm, which was initially scary, but the rules were clear from day one that we would prioritize those fundamentals.3. Cutting corners doesn't increase profitsSome people think cutting corners gets you a more profitable bottom line, but that is not the case. Cutting costs often undermines guest trust. You lose the customer trust, and the brands that endure are the ones that deliver authenticity, quality, and transparency every time.We're trying to be very affordable, and we fall somewhere in the middle of the category, but I will never drop quality. I recently partnered with Pat LaFrieda, one of the best high-end butchers in the tristate. Even with our vegetables, we try to get deliveries three to four times per week rather than two times where you could get cheaper products.4. It's about more than foodPeople think that it's all about the food, but people matter so much too. What keeps guests coming back and what keeps your team thriving is a culture of service, training, and retention.I take extremely good care of my team.…

A Ukrainian unit used a drone to bring a ground robot closer to Russia's forces.Florent VERGNES / AFPA Ukrainian arms maker said soldiers surprise it with how they use its robots.This includes using an aerial drone to carry and drop it closer to Russian positions.The CEO said Ukrainian soldiers have some "really crazy ideas I would never imagine."A Ukrainian ground robot maker said soldiers surprised it with the ways they used its robots, including using flying drones to drop them closer to Russian positions.Ukraine has a growing army of ground robots that can evacuate the injured, blow up inside or fire on Russian positions, lay or remove mines, carry cargo, and gather intelligence. It's a battlefield technology sector where Ukraine is rapidly experimenting and Western militaries are paying close attention.Ark Robotics is one of the companies supplying these systems, making a suite of autonomous robots used by more than 20 Ukrainian brigades.Its CEO, Achi, told Business Insider that Ukrainian soldiers have demonstrated "some really crazy ideas I would never imagine in my life that you would do." He spoke using a pseudonym as a security precaution.One example involved pairing a small Ark ground robot with a larger aerial drone, which carried the robot forward before "dropping it out of the sky."He said that when he first saw it, his immediate reaction was: "What the fuck? Why?" Then it quickly made sense.Ark Robotics makes ground robots, including its small A1 model.Ark Robotics"The goal is simple: get a tool on the ground fast without putting a person in harm's way."Ultimately, he found, "it works."He said this use "wasn't the robot's original design, but give smart, motivated people a tool, and they'll find new ways to use it — and squeeze more out of it."The "soldiers keep surprising us," Achi said. "They are very creative."Getting creativeAerial drones are available in significant numbers and are able to cover great distances quickly. Using them to transport ground robots helps overcome some of the weaknesses and vulnerabilities of the robots, which have notable advantages once deployed.Small ground robots can do things that are sometimes more challenging for aerial drones. They can drive into Russian dugouts or other positions to gather intelligence or deliver explosives. They can also be more precise when firing mounted weapons, and they are easier to conceal near Russian positions than aerial drones, which are noisy and have to hover overhead.Ukraine and Russia are both rapidly innovating new types of drones, and new ways to stop them.Yevhen Titov/Global Images Ukraine via Getty ImagesAchi described the tactic as one example of how quickly battlefield technology and tactics are evolving in Ukraine."There is so much innovation happening right now that it's hard to comprehend," he said.Other arms makers have also been surprised at how Ukraine's forces have used their weaponry. Kuldar Väärsi, the founder and CEO of Estonia's Milrem Robotics, which makes ground robots used by Ukraine's forces, previously told BI that Ukrainian soldiers have used them in ways he hadn't expected."The creativity of Ukrainian troops is really admirable," he said, adding that the way the company's robots are used in Ukraine has led it to make changes in their design.Milrem Robotics has its ground drones in Ukraine, with soldiers' use surprising the company.Mykhaylo Palinchak/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty ImagesCompanies with products deployed in Ukraine are seeking constant feedback from soldiers, often through group chats, video calls, and direct visits to front-line units.Robotic warfareAchi said the challenge for Ark Robotics is keeping pace with new ideas without changing products so rapidly that large-scale production becomes impossible.Ark needs to experiment constantly and stay aware of what's happening on the battlefield, but focusing on the wrong trends would mean sacrificing both mass and quality."This iteration cycle is insane.…