Three companies in Fast Company’s 2026 Next Big Things in Tech coverage show how established businesses are pursuing emerging needs: Rippling is applying AI to company administration, Seekr is building an enterprise AI platform for consequential settings, and Ultrasound AI is using image analysis to estimate pregnancy due dates. They are illustrative honorees, not proof that established companies generally innovate at startup speed.
What “innovating like startups” means in this feature
Ross Rubin’s Fast Company feature, published October 6, 2026, selects three honorees whose work addresses distinct problems rather than a single technology market. Its examples range from business software to government-oriented AI infrastructure to clinical ultrasound analysis. The common thread is an attempt to develop tools for needs the companies identify as emerging—not a measured comparison of their pace, outcomes, or performance against startups.
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How the three companies are applying new technology
| Company and product | Input or context | Task it supports | What Fast Company reports |
|---|---|---|---|
| Rippling | Company data structures, context, and controls | Administrative work across HR, IT, and finance | Its AI can use native business context so outputs reflect the state of a company. |
| Seekr / SeekrFlow | An organization’s own data | Creating, deploying, and managing large language models | The platform is aimed at enterprise, government, defense, and regulated-industry settings, with attention to data quality and oversight. |
| Ultrasound AI / Delivery Date AI (DDAI) | A standard ultrasound image | Estimating a pregnancy delivery date | The article says DDAI predicts a date in less than a minute and reports FDA De Novo clearance in February 2026. |
Rippling: AI that uses company context
Fast Company describes Rippling as a platform that streamlines administrative work in HR, IT, and finance. Its example of innovation is AI that can draw on a company’s underlying data structures, business context, and controls. That grounding is intended to make assistance more relevant to how a particular organization actually operates, rather than relying only on generic prompts.
The potential value, as framed by the feature, is support for administrative tasks that could leave employees more time for strategic work. The article’s description is not an independent assessment of the product’s accuracy, safeguards, or results in practice.
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SeekrFlow: enterprise AI for consequential environments
Fast Company presents SeekrFlow as an end-to-end platform for creating, deploying, and managing large language models with an organization’s own data. The feature emphasizes its intended enterprise, government, defense, and regulated-industry use, along with data quality and oversight—concerns that matter when AI is deployed in settings where outputs may affect important decisions.
The article reports that Seekr partnered with General Dynamics Information Technology on agentic AI solutions for federal agencies and that SeekrFlow is available on AWS GovCloud. Those are reported partnership and availability claims; deployment details can change, and the article does not establish how broadly the platform is being used or how it performs.
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Ultrasound AI: estimating a pregnancy due date from an image
Fast Company describes Ultrasound AI’s Delivery Date AI (DDAI) as analyzing a standard ultrasound image to predict a delivery date in less than a minute, in place of manual formula measurements. A due-date estimate can inform clinical decisions such as when to consider induction or cesarean delivery and how to prepare for a potentially high-risk birth. The article reports that DDAI received FDA De Novo clearance in February 2026.
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Outbyte PC Repair FREEClear out junk files and repair common Windows errorsFree Scan →Outbyte Driver Updater FREEFix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesFind Drivers →The clearance statement here reflects Fast Company’s report; the article does not supply independently verified regulatory documentation or the precise intended-use wording. The reported milestone should not be read as a general claim that the technology replaces clinical judgment or is available for every pregnancy or care setting.
Rank #3
What these examples do—and do not—show
The three cases differ in users, inputs, and decisions: business operations teams work with company records; enterprise and government teams deploy AI using organizational data; clinicians may use ultrasound analysis to support a pregnancy due-date estimate. This variety illustrates that innovation in established companies can include software and clinical applications, not just consumer devices.
But the feature is an award selection with reported product descriptions, not a comparative study. It does not establish that these products outperform alternatives, that their companies move as quickly as startups, or that established companies generally achieve startup-like results.
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