Andrew Yang, the entrepreneur and 2020 presidential candidate, is betting that the next big wave of startup innovation will come from businesses designed to reduce the cost of living rather than extract more money from consumers. Speaking on TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Yang pointed to a short list of categories he considers ripe for disruption: housing, education, food, fuel, transportation, media, and wireless. The idea, he said, is to build companies whose value proposition is the margin they return to the customer rather than the profit they keep. Yang was inspired by Mark Cuban's Cost Plus Drugs, which sells pharmaceuticals at cost plus a flat markup, and the broader category of "cost plus" businesses that he believes will define the next generation of consumer startups. Examples already in the market include Cuban's pharmacy, the minimalist phone maker Light Phone, and online grocery service Misfits Market.

Yang put his thesis into practice in September 2025 with the launch of Noble Mobile, a mobile virtual network operator (MVNO) that offers cell service at a fraction of traditional carrier prices and actually pays customers back when they use less data. The move was a direct application of the cost-plus philosophy to the wireless industry, one of the largest recurring expenses for American households. Yang frames the timing as urgent, arguing that as AI continues to automate work and compress wages, the pressure on everyday Americans to find affordable basics will only intensify. "AI is going to suck up a lot of the value and the jobs, and then Americans are going to look up and say, 'How do I meet basic needs?'" Yang said, suggesting that meeting those needs "less expensively" represents "a very rich vein of opportunity."

The instinct behind Noble Mobile traces back to Yang's 2020 presidential campaign, which centered on Universal Basic Income as a response to AI-driven job displacement and wealth concentration. Though the campaign itself fell short, Yang says the underlying thesis has only grown more relevant. He remains a vocal UBI advocate, arguing that value created by AI companies must be redistributed to ordinary Americans, but he's skeptical that government is the right delivery mechanism. Yang worries that any wealth collected by policymakers will simply be used to "plug a hole and do something not terribly productive," and believes there is room for a more direct connection between money and the people who need it. That, he argues, is where market incentives can do what policy often cannot.