SUMMARY

Entrepreneur Daniel Priestley warns that AI has rendered existing businesses obsolete, sharing mental models for reinvention, including rethinking operations, leveraging AI as an advanced workforce, and building new competitive moats through exclusivity, community, and experience.

STATEMENTS

• AI disruption will dwarf previous economic shocks like the dotcom crash, global financial crisis, Brexit, and the pandemic, requiring complete reinvention of business decisions from CRM systems to team roles.
• Acknowledging that the current business model is dead allows for rebuilding from scratch, starting with fundamental questions about concept, audience, offer, and sales in a post-AI world.
• Speed to value involves identifying customer outcomes and using AI to deliver them as quickly as possible, such as creating an AI portal that completes 80% of key tasks for clients in minutes.
• Businesses like Rethink Press pivoted by extracting intellectual property into AI-driven tools like Bookmagic.ai, maintaining seven-figure revenues while adding 400 subscribers at $50 monthly.
• The "Atlantis has risen" mindset treats AI as a mythical advanced civilization of PhD-level experts working for free, enabling delegation of complex tasks like marketing assistance or consulting rewrites to AI agents.
• Traditional business moats, such as proprietary code in software, are eroding because AI can replicate them easily, necessitating new protections focused on niche dominance.
• New moats require defining a game where the business ranks in the top 10%, then layering exclusivity (limited access or entry criteria), community (curated networking), and experience (shared real-world events).

IDEAS

• Every prior business decision, from marketing strategies to hiring, becomes invalid in an AI era, prompting a symbolic "funeral" for the old model to spark radical innovation.
• AI enables "speed to value" by automating 80% of desired outcomes, like generating personalized business reinvention plans, far faster than human processes alone.
• Pivoting established ventures, such as transforming a coaching-heavy publishing service into an AI-guided platform, can sustain revenues while scaling new subscription models effortlessly.
• Imagining AI as "Atlantis risen"—a submerged utopia of billion free PhD workers—reframes business operations, turning simple services into sophisticated, agentic ecosystems.
• Old competitive advantages like custom software code vanish as AI democratizes creation, shifting focus to human-centric elements that machines can't replicate.
• Niching down to top-10% expertise in hyper-specific domains, like marathon training for men over 45, creates defensible positions amid widespread AI commoditization.
• Exclusivity builds moats by rejecting most applicants or imposing strict criteria, fostering scarcity that elevates perceived value beyond AI's reach.
• Curated communities among high-caliber clients provide networking moats, where shared introductions and insights form barriers to entry for outsiders.
• Experiential elements, such as exclusive retreats or events like skiing trips with entrepreneurs, forge emotional bonds that AI can't duplicate, strengthening loyalty.
• Combining niche mastery with exclusivity, community, and experience forms a "triangle" moat, propelling businesses from survival to 10x growth in the AI age.

INSIGHTS

• Recognizing business obsolescence isn't defeat but liberation, freeing entrepreneurs to question core assumptions and harness AI for unprecedented speed and scale in value delivery.
• AI's agentic capabilities elevate it from a tool to an invisible workforce, demanding a mindset shift that unlocks exponential service enhancements without proportional cost increases.
• As AI erodes technical barriers, true differentiation lies in human elements like selective access and shared experiences, which cultivate irreplaceable loyalty and network effects.
• Niching to elite proficiency in tailored domains protects against commoditization, allowing AI to amplify execution while humans curate the irreplaceable relational fabric.
• The interplay of exclusivity, community, and experience creates self-reinforcing moats, transforming isolated services into thriving ecosystems that outpace AI-driven copycats.
• Thriving post-AI requires proactive reinvention within 12-24 months, turning disruption into opportunity for 10x growth by integrating AI as a foundational, not supplementary, asset.

QUOTES

• "The bad news is your business is already dead. AI has killed it and you need to reinvent it. The good news is you've got 12 to 24 months to reinvent your business."
• "What if we discovered that there's now a billion people living in Atlantis, they all have a master's degree or a PhD in all sorts of different things and they're willing to work for free?"
• "In a post AI world, we can just simply ask AI to build something that's very similar and it can do all that coding for you and that makes it very easy for people to copy a software business."
• "We're probably not just in the top 10%, we're probably in the top 1 or 0.1% of doing that in the world because we've been doing it so long and we've got all the frameworks really nailed down."
• "If you apply those key ideas, you're not just going to survive the AI disruption, you're going to thrive post AI disruption."

HABITS

• Hold symbolic team retreats, like staging a "funeral" for the old business model, to collectively commit to reinvention and brainstorm from a clean slate.
• Regularly question core business elements—concept, audience, offer, sales—using AI possibilities to accelerate customer outcomes and test new pivots.
• Delegate tasks to AI "Atlanteans" by framing them as assignments to expert agents, integrating advanced automation into daily operations for enhanced client value.
• Define and dominate a top-10% niche, then enforce exclusivity through application filters or revenue thresholds to curate high-value interactions.
• Foster community and experiences by organizing real-world events, such as dinners or retreats, to build lasting client relationships beyond digital services.

FACTS

• Daniel Priestley has launched seven startups that reached $1 million in revenue within their first 12 months, with three exceeding $10 million valuations.
• AI disruption is projected to outscale historical events like the dotcom crash, global financial crisis, Brexit, and the pandemic in economic impact.
• Dent Accelerators receives about 100 applications per accepted client, maintaining strict exclusivity in selecting participants for influence-building programs.
• Bookmagic.ai, an AI-driven book-writing platform, has already signed up 400 subscribers paying approximately $50 monthly, generating new revenue streams.
• Dent has specialized in producing key people of influence for 15 years, positioning it potentially in the global top 0.1% for founder-led growth frameworks.

REFERENCES

• Diary of a CEO podcast, featuring a longer discussion on AI's transformative effects.
• Dent Accelerators, a program for reinventing businesses and building influence through AI-enhanced outcomes like standing out, scaling up, and impacting the world.
• Bookmagic.ai, an AI portal spun from Rethink Press for guiding users through book writing.
• Score App, a subscription service enhanced by AI agents for ongoing client support.
• Ski Person of Influence and Necker Island retreat with Richard Branson, exclusive experiences for Dent clients.

HOW TO APPLY

• Conduct a "business funeral" exercise with your team: symbolically declare the current model dead, then rebuild by questioning every decision from CRM to hiring, using AI to prototype new structures.
• Assess speed to value by listing top customer outcomes, then build an AI tool—such as a portal—that automates 80% of delivery, inputting basic client data to generate instant results.
• Adopt the "Atlantis risen" mindset: For each client service, imagine assigning free PhD-level AI agents for tasks like website audits or pitch optimizations, then implement via agentic AI platforms.
• Define your top-10% game: Identify a hyper-specific niche where you excel, such as industry-tailored expertise, and validate it against competitors to ensure defensible positioning.
• Layer moat ingredients: Introduce exclusivity by setting entry criteria (e.g., revenue minimums), build community through curated networking events, and add experiences like group retreats to create unbreakable loyalty.

ONE-SENTENCE TAKEAWAY

Embrace AI-driven reinvention now to transform your obsolete business into a thriving, moat-protected powerhouse within 12-24 months.

RECOMMENDATIONS

• Immediately audit and discard outdated decisions, replacing them with AI-first strategies to capture quick wins in customer value delivery.
• Shift to an "Atlantis" worldview, delegating complex tasks to AI agents to expand services without inflating costs or headcount.
• Carve a top-10% niche and fortify it with exclusivity, ensuring only premium clients enter your ecosystem for sustained differentiation.
• Invest in community-building events and shared experiences to forge emotional moats that AI competitors can't breach.
• Monitor AI advancements weekly, pivoting one core offering—like coaching to AI portals—to test and scale subscription-based revenue.

MEMO

In a stark wake-up call for entrepreneurs, Daniel Priestley declares that AI has already buried the traditional business model. Every choice—from customer relationship management tools to marketing playbooks and team compositions—must be scrapped and reimagined in this agentic era. Drawing from two decades of launching seven startups that hit million-dollar revenues in their first year, Priestley shares how he and his inner circle are navigating this upheaval. At a recent retreat in Portugal, his team even erected a mock tombstone for their company, marking a ritualistic end to the old ways and a bold beginning for AI-infused rebirth. This disruption, he warns, eclipses the dotcom bust, financial crashes, Brexit, and pandemics combined, offering a narrow 12-to-24-month window to not just survive, but explode to 10 times the scale.

The first mental pivot Priestley advocates is ruthless acknowledgment: Your business is dead, so question its bones. Do you cling to the same audience or offerings, or pivot entirely? Central to this is "speed to value"—pinpointing what customers crave most, then wielding AI to deliver it at inhuman speeds. In his Dent Accelerators program, for instance, clients seek to stand out, scale, and dent the universe; an AI portal now automates 80% of 17 key steps, from personalized branding to growth hacks, after users input basic details. Priestley's Rethink Press, a seven-figure book publishing firm once reliant on hands-on coaching, spun off Bookmagic.ai—a step-by-step AI guide that has enrolled 400 subscribers at $50 monthly, preserving core revenues while unlocking new streams. Such innovations prove that declaring obsolescence isn't despair; it's the spark for agile evolution.

Enter the "Atlantis has risen" mindset, Priestley's poetic frame for AI's emergence. Mythical Atlantis, the fabled advanced city sunk beneath the waves, now resurfaces as a metaphor for agentic AI: a civilization of billions, each a PhD expert, laboring gratis from your pocket. This reframing explodes possibilities—imagine assigning Atlantean agents to audit client websites, refine pitches like McKinsey consultants, or generate reports that make subscriptions irresistible. At Score App, Priestley deploys these "Atlanteans" to clients, ensuring sticky value that deters churn. Without this expansive thinking, businesses languish in simplistic tasks; with it, they delegate sophistication, serving customers in ways previously unimaginable.

Yet AI's gifts come with pitfalls: Traditional moats, like proprietary software code, crumble as models replicate them effortlessly. Priestley charts new defenses—a "moat triangle" built on niche mastery, exclusivity, community, and experience. First, claim top-10% dominance in a precise arena, such as guiding over-45 men to marathons or academics to YouTube stardom. Layer exclusivity via velvet ropes: Dent rejects 99 of 100 applicants, or demands million-dollar revenues. Community follows, curating networks where clients swap insights and intros among peers. Experiences seal the bond—ski trips, dinners, even a Necker Island week with Richard Branson for Dent's elite. After 15 years honing founder-led growth, Dent isn't just top 10%; it's likely 0.1%, using AI for flawless delivery within this fortified ecosystem. Apply these, Priestley urges, and watch your venture surge from millions to tens or hundreds.