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In Brief

Sometimes, founding a startup just once isn’t enough.

At least, that seems to be the case with companies like Airtable, Handshake, and Opendoor, which all announced in recent months that they are “refounding.” As reported in The New York Times these announcements are usually tied to new business models or the launch of new AI products.

For example, Airtable said in June that “instead of just adding more A.I. capabilities to our existing platform, we treated this as a refounding moment for the company.

The startup’s co-founder and CEO Howie Liu told the NYT that this is not a pivot because it’s not about changing direction after getting something wrong. Liu said the company considered calling it a relaunch or transformation, but ultimately chose “the language of founding because the stakes feel the same.”

Similarly, Handshake’s chief marketing officer Katherine Kelly said the company is trying to bring startup culture “back into an existing business.” That can also mean harder work — Kelly said handshake told employees they have to be back in the office five days a week, “operating with a pace and number of hours that is meaningful and will help us hit goals.”

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