What I changed my mind about in 2026 was the role I expected outsourcing to play as we continued to scale the business.
Boost is constantly growing, and we are always planning not just for the needs of today, but for where the business is headed next. With technology advancing just as quickly, we expected third-party technology to play a greater role in supporting that continued growth. We planned and budgeted accordingly, particularly in areas like data and security.
What changed over the course of the year was how quickly artificial intelligence advanced, and how much more capable our own teams became as we added targeted technical talent to support that work.
As those hires came into the organization and we began applying AI more broadly, we realized that some of the capabilities we had expected to supplement externally were things we could increasingly build and manage ourselves. AI was not simply giving us another tool. In the hands of people with the right expertise, coupled with our extensive in-house expertise, AI has materially expanded what our teams were capable of developing internally.
That was a meaningful shift for us.
In many cases, building internally also made more sense economically. It also gave us greater control over the end result. We could develop capabilities around the specific needs of our business, move more quickly as those needs evolved and maintain greater control over how the technology was built and applied.
The more we worked with AI, the clearer it became that the technology itself was only part of the advantage. At Boost, we already had deep B2B payments expertise, proprietary data, institutional knowledge and a strong understanding of the businesses we serve. Pairing those strengths with increasingly capable AI and the right technical talent expanded what we could realistically build ourselves.
That does not mean third-party technology is any less valuable. There will always be situations where specialized outside technology or expertise is the right answer, even if such activities are very prescriptive. The shift is not about AI replacing vendors. It is about recognizing what becomes possible when AI is combined with strong internal expertise.
Going into Q4, that continues to shape how we think about technology investment and scale. We are looking more closely at how technology can extend the capabilities already inside the organization and where building internally can give us greater speed, control and economic value.
The biggest lesson for me is that artificial intelligence can materially expand what a business is capable of building, but the technology alone is not the differentiator. The real advantage comes from the people implementing it and the expertise they bring with them.
