• A sports dietitian strength trains or runs almost every morning before her kids wake up.
• She shared how she eats enough protein, carbs, and fiber throughout the day.
• She meal-preps most of her meals, from turkey meatballs to sheet pan dinners.

At 4:30 a.m., before her husband and two kids are up, Morgan Walker is typically just starting her workout.

“I’m kind of a first-thing-in-the-morning type of person when it comes to exercise,” Walker, a 32-year-old registered sports dietitian at Lebanon Valley College in Pennsylvania, told Business Insider.

Walker focuses her own workouts on a mix of cardio and strength training. Each week, she spends three to four days building muscle mass by gradually increasing the weights and rep counts of exercises like bench presses, deadlifts, and squats. She also runs twice a week, for up to an hour at a time.

Occasionally, she’ll throw in a higher-intensity workout. “Usually, it’s a shorter session that’s 30 minutes during one of my kids’ naps where I’ll do some sprint intervals or use our heavyweight bag at home,” she said. The rest of the time, she and her husband try to walk outside as much as possible with their kids, who are three and one and a half years old.

Fueling up for her workouts takes a little effort — Walker said she preps the bulk of her meals in advance, from homemade meatballs to sheet-pan dinners.

She also has to consider her children’s preferences. “I have one who will eat everything, and then one — she’s been doing a lot better, but is a little bit on the pickier side.”

Walker shared the protein-packed, nutrient-dense meals she eats to build muscle, feel energized for workouts, and stay full throughout the day.

Dried fruit for a pre-workout boost

Right when she gets up, Walker starts with a small snack.

“I always have something small, easy to digest, and carbohydrate-focused,” she said. Her favorite pre-workout snacks are dried fruits (such as dried mango), applesauce, or half of a granola bar.

She sneaks in protein-packed cottage cheese and Greek yogurt

Walker loves cottage cheese and Greek yogurt, both of which are high in protein and easy to incorporate into meals.

They tend to be some of her favorite protein sources for breakfast, which she eats right after working out. One of her go-to breakfasts is mixing overnight oats, another high-protein food, with Greek yogurt, milk, and occasionally whey protein powder. She’ll top it with fruits and chia seeds for extra nutrients.

Cottage cheese often features in her lunches, such as when she blends it into butternut squash soup for added protein. Another recent favorite is her take on a baked sweet potato: “Putting cottage cheese on top of that with pumpkin seeds and walnuts and a small drizzle of honey, that’s been something kind of easy, and satisfying too.”

Snacks include quick smoothies made with yogurt, frozen fruit, and protein powder, or low-fat Greek yogurt topped with fruit and dark chocolate to satisfy her sweet tooth.

“I’ve been on a big pistachio kick lately, so recently it’s been blackberries and pistachios and just a small drizzle of honey,” she said.

She meal-preps lean protein sources like turkey meatballs and sheet-pan eggs

Walker prefers lean, whole protein sources such as chicken, turkey, fish, and eggs, which have lower cholesterol than beef or processed meats.

To save time in the morning, she meal-preps homemade chicken and sage patties, baking them in the oven. She also bakes eggs on a sheet pan, cutting them up and reheating them instead of using a skillet.

After a hard workout, she’ll have a breakfast sandwich that she preps in advance — eggs and a patty on an English muffin or bagel for replenishing carbohydrates paired with fruit for extra fiber.

For dinner, she has a rotation of protein-forward options. “Because I have two kids, I have to keep in mind things that are also going to be friendly with them,” she said. They love turkey meatloaf, which she pairs with steamed vegetables and either baked potatoes or a grain such as farro or quinoa.

If the kids prefer pasta, she swaps regular pasta for protein-enhanced lentil pasta, which she serves with a homemade meat sauce or chicken-and-turkey meatballs that she batch makes and freezes in advance for easy meals throughout the week.

Sheet pan dinners pack in lots of nutrients

Walker is a huge fan of sheet-pan meals. She pairs a main protein source, like a grilled chicken breast or one of her sausage patties, with roasted seasonal vegetables for fiber.

“I do really love the seasonal fall veggies,” she said. A recent meal included maple-dijon grilled chicken, turmeric couscous, and roasted beets and Brussels sprouts.

She also tries to add fiber into her main protein sources, such as cannelini beans in her meatball-and-pasta dinners.

She makes homemade sweets and pairs them with fruit

While sweets like ice cream don’t help with gym gains, Walker still enjoys them.

“I’m somebody who does find value in that all foods do fit,” she said. “Especially with my kids, it’s something I want to teach them.”

If they eat dark chocolate, she pairs it with fresh fruit, such as grapes, to encourage them to enjoy both.

She also makes many sweets like cupcakes and cookies from scratch, but always in smaller portions. She likes to freeze cookie dough to bake occasional fresh cookies.

“The kids really enjoy it, but we don’t just have a whole plateful in the house all week,” she said.

For Jan Gilg, SAP’s co-chief revenue officer and head of the Americas market and the global Business Suite, thriving within today’s economic climate and technology imperatives isn’t about avoiding disruption. It’s about using the agility those challenges cultivate to drive innovation.

That can start with understanding what’s proprietary about your business versus what’s a process most businesses rely on. Gilg refers to this as “standardizing where you don’t differentiate.” In other words, automating standard processes that don’t create value.

The question, Gilg then posed, is “where is the innovation happening?” In his view, determining which area of their enterprise management tech stack to target for innovation can be as critical as the areas of the world where they do business.

“I see that as being located on the layer above automated processes, where you can tap into your data,” said Gilg.

“It’s really about having an integrated set of business applications based on harmonized data models and a unified user experience.” That, Gilg said, “is where you build your innovation and drive the most valuable business outcomes.”

Innovation atop automation

The SAP Business Suite — where SAP’s core applications, data, and AI come together — supports this operational layering: connecting processes with modular business applications, on top of which AI and other innovations can cut through complexity to supercharge transformation.

The symbiosis the suite strikes between automation and innovation is in step with the current global C Suite perspective. In surveying 3,000 C-suite executives for its recent Pulse of Change report, Accenture found that 39% of organizations are accelerating automation to mitigate the impact of tariffs. Nearly 70% reported seeing AI as a driver of revenue growth, with half saying they would accelerate AI investment even in a recession.

To turn this resolve around AI into real ROI, Gilg and his team advocate a unified, intelligent approach that can yield insights from increasingly dense data and create system-wide visibility to drive business outcomes. This, a key foundation in the architecture of the SAP Business Suite, creates the ability to keep pace with rapid technological shifts. This includes agility to onboard emerging technology, like the current rise of AI agents — autonomous and proactive taskmasters empowered to pursue pre ordained goals.

Enterprise management in the age of agents

Signaling their momentum in business applications, earnings-call mentions of AI agents quadrupled across the fourth quarter of 2024, according to analysis by CB Insights. The group also found that more than 60% of leaders place high importance on AI agent deployment over the coming year.

Gilg sees the rise of agentic AI as analogous to the early days of the SaaS movement, when individual software vendors would bring customers a solution for a single need, creating a patchwork system that IT teams found difficult to integrate. Those arduous integrations as companies migrated from on premises to the cloud are a reason SAP worked to make its native AI agents compatible from inception.

“I believe we are really at the brink of a new era of intelligent operations. Because agents don’t care about organizational silos, and they just want to get the job done as efficiently as possible. That’s why I really think we will see another leapfrog now in terms of productivity gains.”

“Having your agents communicate with each other out of the box is a huge advantage with the Business Suite,” Gilg said. They can hand over tasks along a process and get work done end-to-end. That way you can address much more complex scenarios.”

Gilg also draws on his background overseeing on-premise to cloud transitions to understand that customers won’t accept breaks in the fluidity of hand-offs between AI agents — an orchestrated flow built into the ways SAP supports agentic infrastructure.

“I know it sounds futuristic,” he said, “but the workforce of the future in my mind will be a hybrid force between humans and agents.”

On the horizon: uncertainty tempered by insight

That future also appears to be one characterized by uncertainty. In its most recent quarterly survey of global financial professionals to determine economic outlook, the Association of International Certified Professional Accountants found that confidence in their own organizations’ prospects fell from 50% in the first quarter of the year to only 37% as of May. The global outlook held by these leaders dropped 10 points between surveys, with only 19% expressing optimism.

“Every C-level leader feels the pressure to do more with less,” Gilg said. The bright side, as he sees it, is that technology has matured to the point it can deliver on that need.

“I truly believe companies have an opportunity right now to modernize their IT to really embrace that: to have a hard look into how to optimize the way they’re working and leapfrog in productivity gains and insights.”

The outcome of that ERP modernization, he promised, will be unprecedented insight and foresight.

“Suddenly, you’ll see far above and beyond the four walls of your enterprise, allowing you to see disruptions much, much earlier. And that creates a much more sustainable resilience.”

Explore the SAP Business Suite here.

• Hundreds of thousands of travelers have seen their flights disrupted due to the US government shutdown.
• Industry groups say schedules and capacity cannot bounce back immediately after a deal is reached to reopen.
• Cancellation rates peaked on Saturday, and the residual impact could take several days to unwind.

America’s travel nightmare isn’t over yet.

Even as US lawmakers negotiate a reopening of the Federal government, the effects of the shutdown could take a while longer to return to normal.

“This is not a rubber band, so it’s not going to snap back,” Aviation strategist Henry Harteveldt, president of Atmosphere Research Group, told Business Insider.

He estimated it could take seven to 14 days for flight schedules to return to normal after the government reopens, and expects the government and airlines to want to minimize disruptions to the Thanksgiving travel period.

One key complication affecting flights during this government shutdown compared to the last one in 2019 is that airlines are facing new restrictions from the Federal Aviation Administration on the number of routes they’re allowed to fly.

The FAA instructed airlines to begin canceling flights last Friday because of the strain on air traffic controllers caused by the government shutdown, which resulted in many controllers working without pay.

“In a way, it was easier for the airlines to restore operations following that shutdown,” Harteveldt said. “That’s why it’s going to take a little bit more time for airlines to return to normal this time.”

The Senate voted on Monday to reopen the government, and the bill will go to the House of Representatives next. If the measure passes this week, airlines would still have a significant backlog to work through.

Even under normal circumstances, NerdWallet’s travel rewards expert, Sally French, told Business Insider that one canceled flight can disrupt others, leaving pilots, flight attendants, and planes far from their typically scheduled routes.

“People shouldn’t just automatically assume if they have a flight this weekend, that everything is going to be exactly perfect,” she said. “There’s still going to be kind of the snowball effect.”

Flight cancellations spiked over the weekend

Airlines for America, an industry group that includes the largest carriers like American, Delta, and United, said in a report that the shutdown has affected the travel of more than 5.2 million passengers from October 1 to November 9.

“Airlines’ reduced flight schedules cannot immediately bounce back to full capacity right after the government reopens,” the group said in a statement on Monday. “There will be residual effects for days.”

American Airlines COO David Seymour said in an internal memo Monday that about 250,000 of the carrier’s customers were affected by the cancellations and delays over the past weekend.

“This is simply unacceptable, and everyone deserves better,” Seymore said.

Data from aviation analytics company Cirium shows cancellations for US departure flights peaked over the weekend on Sunday, with 10.2% of flights canceled, while the share of flights leaving on time fell to 62% that day. Data from OAG aviation shows that on-time rates for top-performing airports typically range between 75% to 87%.

As of Tuesday morning, the data showed the rates of planned cancellations were showing signs of improvement. Cirium also said mid-week travel days are generally slower, which could help airlines play catch-up.

At New York’s JFK airport at midday on Tuesday, Business Insider saw growing lines at security and four cancellations out of 24 scheduled Delta flights.

Although TSA agents appeared busier than usual, passengers were moving mostly smoothly through Terminal 4.

The FAA said travelers should check fly.faa.gov for real-time updates about staffing, weather, and other information, and to check with their airlines before heading to the airport.

NerdWallet’s French compared the disruption to the seasonal delays that cause knock-on effects to travel in Dallas due to blizzards in Boston or thunderstorms in Atlanta.

“This could be a really challenging Thanksgiving travel season, and Thanksgiving is almost always a challenging time to fly,” she said.

• Business Insider asked three chefs about their favorite appetizers to make in an air fryer.
• Game-day classics like nachos and jalapeño poppers come perfectly crispy in the air fryer.
• Stuffed mushrooms maintain their flavor without becoming too soggy.

Thanks to air fryers, preparing crispy, easy-to-snack-on appetizers is simpler than ever.

Although the appliance is a staple for most home cooks, it’s also beloved by many professional chefs.

To help narrow down the best appetizers to make in an air fryer, Business Insider asked three chefs for their favorites. Here’s what they said.

Jalapeño poppers are a game-day staple.

According to Olivia Roszkowski, chef-instructor at the Institute of Culinary Education, the air fryer is great for making jalapeño poppers.

She said the appliance allows the exterior breading or batter to stay crunchy and golden while the cheesy center becomes “molten” without getting too stringy.

Homemade spring rolls are easy to prep ahead and make when cravings strike.

Chef Maricel Gentile, owner at Maricel’s Kitchen, recommends making homemade vegetable or pork spring rolls as an impressive appetizer.

She said these are easy to make and can be prepped and frozen ahead of time.

According to Gentile, the air fryer makes the spring rolls light and crispy and prevents them from getting overbaked, soggy, or greasy.

Air fried stuffed mushrooms are a tasty appetizer with a distinct flavor.

When it comes to appetizers, mushrooms are often skipped over because they can lose water and become too soggy.

However, both Christopher Lindsay — a chef-instructor at the University of Nevada — and Roszkowski love making stuffed mushrooms in the air fryer.

“Stuffed mushrooms are delicious when made in the air fryer because the mushrooms themselves do not lose too much volume, which often happens in a conventional or convection oven,” Roszkowski told BI.

Lindsay recommends thoroughly cleaning and drying the mushrooms and lightly spraying the bottom of the air-fryer basket to prevent sticking.

Then, the chef places the stuffed mushrooms inside, being careful to avoid overcrowding, and cooks the dish at 390 to 400 degrees Fahrenheit until the cheesy stuffing is golden and bubbly.

Spinach-artichoke dip comes together quickly in the air fryer.

Roszkowski told BI it’s a good idea to make a dish like spinach-artichoke dip in the air fryer. She said this method takes about one-third of the time it would in the oven and still turns out golden and gooey.

To make the dip, Roszkowski suggests prepping it in an oven-safe ceramic dish. Then, cook the dip in the air fryer until golden and bubbling, and pair it with warm bread, pita chips, or sliced veggies.

Impress guests with a Filipino dish like veggie- and shrimp-loaded ukoy.

Ukoy is a crispy, comforting, fried Filipino fritter made with unpeeled shrimp, shredded vegetables, and a simple batter of cornstarch, flour, and water.

Gentile likes to make these fritters in the air fryer to skip the time it takes to deep-fry them. The chef said this dish could also be made without shrimp for a vegetarian alternative.

Bacon-wrapped dates are perfect for elegant dinner parties.

Bacon-wrapped dates, a popular go-to appetizer for dinner parties and potlucks, are another great option for the air fryer. The appliance quickly crisps up the bacon while letting the cheese filling (if used) soften without burning.

“I’ve been perfecting bacon-wrapped dates stuffed with gorgonzola and a smoked almond in my convection oven for years, typically baking them for 25 to 30 minutes,” Lindsay said.

However, if you want to make the appetizer in a slightly shorter timeframe, the chef recommends preheating the air fryer for five minutes and baking the dates for 15 to 20 minutes.

Nachos can reach ultimate crispiness in the air fryer.

Roszkowski is all for going big on game day with freshly made nachos served with guacamole, salsa, and sour cream on the side.

“The tortilla chips don’t get soggy because of the hot, dry circulating air and the quicker cooking time,” Roszkowski said. “This allows you to be generous with your toppings.”

The chef also recommends lining the air fryer tray with parchment paper for easy cleanup.

Chorizo-and-pepper-stuffed puff pastry could really wow guests.

Store-bought puff pastry is arguably one of the most popular appetizer ingredients, especially for wrapped or rolled air-fryer dishes.

Lindsay likes to stuff puff pastry with chorizo, corn, red bell peppers, jalapeños, cotija cheese, and seasonings. Then, he folds the pastry and air-fries the dish until golden.

He serves the appetizer with fresh guacamole and salsa for a crowd-pleasing dish.

Go for a sweet and savory combination of ham, Brie, and pears or apples.

If you want an elevated appetizer that requires little prep time, Lindsay recommends covering a slab of Brie with pears or Cosmic Crisp apples cut batonnet style (into straight strips) and fresh thyme.

Then, the chef rolls the ingredients into ham slices cut off the bone, places the dish seam-side down in the air fryer, and heats it up.

Consider upgrading pizza or pasta night with air fried garlic bread.

Level up game night or family dinner with hot, fresh garlic bread.

“Garlic bread is the perfect appetizer to make in an air fryer because the generous blast of hot air simultaneously toasts the bread, melts the Parmesan cheese, and cooks the garlic without getting too brown and crusty,” Roszkowski said. 

The chef suggests finishing the dish with a sprinkle of fresh parsley to really wow dinner guests.

This story was originally published on February 8, 2025, and most recently updated on November 11, 2025.

• A neuroscientist keeps his brain healthy and youthful with daily mental and physical exercises.
• His routine includes biking, weight training, Sudoku, and dancing lessons with his wife every week.
• He follows a Mediterranean diet, supplements omega-3s, and manages stress to support brain health.

By the time Dr. Majid Fotuhi hits 90 years old, he hopes to be just as sharp as he is today.

The Johns Hopkins neuroscientist has been studying the brain for more than 30 years to understand why our memory and cognitive function can decline as we get older — and how to preserve them.

It’s a popular misconception that the brain is like an old computer that inevitably runs down as we age, he told Business Insider. In fact, he says, it’s a living organ that can grow (or shrink) in response to our day-to-day actions and choices.

‘”On a daily basis, your brain changes just a little bit at the microscopic level,” he said. “When you do certain things over and over again, it can change for better or for worse.”

His latest book, “The Invincible Brain” (out March 3, 2026), details science-backed strategies to prevent cognitive decline.

Fotudi said that since his mid-50s, he’s adjusted his daily routine to increase the odds of becoming a “super-ager”, someone with the cognitive health of someone decades younger.

He said that while it’s not news to him that a healthy lifestyle is good for the brain, he increasingly makes it a priority.

“I am exercising more. I’m really careful about not eating processed food. I take opportunities to challenge myself,” he said.

Here, Fotudi shares a typical day in his routine for better brain health, from a Mediterranean diet to ballroom dancing and Sudoku.

He bikes 60-80 miles a week

Fotudi said his research shows physical activity is key for strengthening the brain.

That’s why he starts every day with some kind of exercise, from a Peloton session to an hour of weight training. The mix of cardio and strength training is a science-backed way to boost longevity.

Once a week, he tackles a longer bike ride, racking up an average of 60 to 80 miles per week on the bike.

All those minutes of pedaling and reps in the gym keep blood flowing through the brain for better memory and processing.

Lean protein, and no donuts

Fotudi follows a Mediterranean diet, with mostly whole, unprocessed foods, lean proteins, and healthy fats like fish.

A typical day for Fotuhi might start with oatmeal, protein powder, and some banana. Around noon, he has a bowl of yogurt. Then blueberries for a snack, and salmon with salad for dinner.

Fotudi said he steers clear of processed foods, especially sweets, since added sugar, salt, and fat can increase inflammation that drives cognitive decline.

Omega-3 — the only supplement with good evidence for brain health, he says

Forget all the pills and powders on the market claiming to boost your brain, Fotuhi said — few supplements are shown to help with cognitive health.

But he does make one exception: omega-3 fatty acids, particularly DHA and EPA.

Fotudi takes 1000 milligrams a day. That’s because more than a decade of high-quality research (including his own) suggests it can help protect memory and mood.

“To me, that’s the only supplement for which there is very strong data to support brain health and prevent Alzheimer’s disease,” Fotuhi said.

Never stop learning

To keep his brain active, Fotuhi said he constantly aims to learn new things and stay socially engaged, both habits that are good for longevity.

“Reading the scientific literature, preparing lectures, mentoring students, I get more than enough dose of cognitive stimulation just through my work,” he said.

Beyond his job, Fotuhi loves chess, plays fast-paced card games with his daughters, and does Sudoku with his wife.

They also take dance lessons once a week and travel frequently, learning about new cultures and checking out museums wherever they go. Fotuhi said he’s visited more than 40 countries and always looks for a challenge along the way.

“We rarely go on a beach and just sit there,” he said.

On a trip to Italy, he decided to swim a mile just to see if he could. Turns out, it “wasn’t that big of a deal.”

Turn off GPS

Along with a mentally challenging job and engaging hobbies, Fotuhi takes every opportunity to engage his brain.

“If I have to do multiplication, I do as much of it as possible in my head or writing, versus using a calculator. When I have to go places, I try not to use GPS as much as possible,” he said. “And I enjoy it because I know that scientific literature has shown for a fact that these things do change the brain.

The brain is like a muscle in the sense that not using it can cause it to weaken and shrink, Fotuhi says. So, daily reps of mental exercise make a difference.

Fotuhi also foregoes physical shortcuts, too, taking the stairs whenever possible.

Over time, tiny, frequent doses of mental and physical workouts add up to big benefits for the brain’s longevity.

Cut down on cortisol

Two of the biggest non-negotiables in Fotuhi’s routine are rest and relaxation.

Throughout the day, worries can cause a spike in levels of a hormone called cortisol. Evidence suggests that can wreak havoc on parts of the brain linked to learning and memory, Fotuhi says.

In contrast, a good night’s sleep is like a reset button, helping to clear toxins like amyloids, linked to Alzheimer’s and heart disease.

“During the deep stage of sleep, your brain goes through a rinsing process. Literally your brain gets washed. We still don’t know why,” Fatuhi said.

Over the years, he’s learned to manage stress so that he falls into a peaceful slumber the second his head hits the pillow. That’s in part because he stays mentally and physically active throughout the day, so he’s ready to rest at night.

He also takes a proactive approach to managing stress, consciously cultivating a positive attitude in the face of daily irritants.

“We expect certain things, and the reality is not the same as what we expected, and we get frustrated,” Fotuhi said. “Mindset can have a huge impact on your day-to-day function and your day-to-day enjoyment.

An antidote to stress is a sense of perspective and purpose, focusing on your larger goals instead of sweating the small stuff.

“I think that it’s okay for things to go wrong,” he said. ” Life will go on.”

• Netflix is planning a major expansion into video podcasts in 2026 to challenge YouTube’s dominance.
• The streamer has told potential partners it’s looking to start with 50 to 75 licensed and original shows.
• Netflix’s proposed terms could be a tough sell for some podcasters, insiders said.

Netflix is ramping up the ambitions of a major video podcast push, set for early 2026, as it seeks to challenge YouTube’s dominance in the space.

The streamer told potential partners it wants to have 50 to 75 shows at launch, two dealmakers told Business Insider, with one hearing the platform is looking to build that number to as many as 200 over time.

Netflix has been reaching out to top Hollywood talent agencies with a broad mandate that calls for licensing existing shows and creating new original ones. It’s looking at a wide variety of genres, including pop culture, true crime, sports, and comedy.

Last month, Netflix announced a deal with Spotify to put popular shows like “The Bill Simmons Podcast” and “The Rewatchables” on its platform. It’s also approached other podcast networks, including iHeartMedia, home to shows like “Jay Shetty Podcast” and “The Breakfast Club,” Bloomberg reported.

Leading Netflix’s licensing efforts is Lauren Smith, Netflix’s VP of content licensing and programming strategy. The original content push is distributed across multiple content teams.

Netflix’s move into podcasts is both a response to YouTube’s growing presence as a TV player and a sign of how Netflix is expanding beyond its core TV and film roots to become a hub people turn to for all kinds of content, including live sports, games, and more.

Netflix’s move into podcasts also shows how far the format has evolved, said Michael Calvin Jones, SVP of Wasserman Creators.

“What began as an audio-only medium has become a visual-first content format, essentially the modern-day counterpart to certain types of television programming that can also live in audio,” he said.

Netflix’s podcast pitch faces potential hurdles

Netflix’s ramp-up is encouraging to podcast insiders who love the prospect of seeing some competition for YouTube and more money flowing into the space. Podcasts have garnered newfound attention from major media companies as YouTube has emerged as the top platform for podcast consumption, surpassing Spotify and Apple. YouTube’s ascent spurred many audio hosts to create video versions of their shows and also drew more influencers to the format. That, in turn, piqued the interest of video streamers like Netflix.

Netflix’s pitch to podcast talent could run into some hurdles. The toughest sell: Netflix is adamant it wants hosts to take the video versions of their podcasts off YouTube. For many, that would entail giving up lucrative ad revenue and reach.

Netflix is promising to put a big marketing push behind the shows and offering money that three talent reps described as competitive. Netflix is pursuing hosts with varying degrees of fame, so the potential deals differ greatly in size, but two agents said they’d seen offers in the neighborhood of $7 million to $8 million for a yearlong licensing deal.

“This is about competing with YouTube,” one agent said.

For some podcast hosts, the velvet-rope nature of Netflix and potential to reach a new audience could be a tantalizing offer. But others who have built large businesses on YouTube will think twice about leaving behind the perks that platform affords. Those include the ability to connect directly with their fans, control their content, and gather a wealth of information about their shows’ performance. Being behind the Netflix paywall could also alienate some of their fans who were accustomed to watching their shows for free.

“It’s such a different business model,” a second agent said. “You’ve got to weigh Netflix against what you can do with your audience.”

Netflix holds its data closer to the chest, and it isn’t clear if it’ll bend on that as part of negotiations. The company has told talent reps it’s thinking about how to replicate community features.

Netflix also wants podcasts to come without host-read ads and run regular TV-style ads in them, just like any other show or movie on its platform, two agents said.

That would undoubtedly be a plus for some hosts who don’t want to read another ad for Casper or Quince. But these types of ads are valued by advertisers for the intimate relationship they convey with the host, and some podcasters may be reluctant to trade what’s been a reliable, long-term source of revenue for them for licensing dollars.

Deals ultimately could take a number of forms. In the case of Netflix’s Spotify deal, for example, the shows are coming with their host-read ads.

Video pods are the new platform battle

Video podcasts have become a new battleground among media platforms and conglomerates, and given rise to mega deals like Alex Cooper‘s $125 million pact with SiriusXM or Amazon’s deal with the Kelce brothers, reported by multiple outlets to be worth about $100 million. Fox bet big this year on podcasts, acquiring Red Seat Ventures, which handles production and ad sales for high-profile conservative podcasters including Tucker Carlson, Megyn Kelly, and Bill O’Reilly.

YouTube hasn’t stood still. It just rolled out AI tools that could sway audio-only podcasters to give the video platform a shot.

For Netflix, video podcasts are part of a push to broaden its offerings, which also includes pursuing independent YouTube stars like Ms. Rachel and Mark Rober, as well as developing games. Video podcasts could be a way for the streamer to keep its viewers engaged as it approaches the limits of subscriber growth in its home US market.

When Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters was asked about the Spotify deal and podcasts in general on an October earnings call, he said he hoped the podcast push “ultimately reinforces our value as the most important service for entertainment needs.”

Netflix also views podcasts as a potential complement to its TV shows. It’s told agents that it wants podcasts that can promote new and renewing titles, in a modern form of the late-night TV show. The streamer is exploring how sports podcasts could interact with its growing live sports offering as well. Netflix hosts Christmas Day NFL games and has some other limited sports programming.