Learning to apply artificial intelligence (AI) assumes asking the right questions, assessing the reliability of information sources, and creating synergy between AI-driven dialogue and human mentorship. This research aims to prepare students for entrepreneurial learning situations where generative artificial intelligence tools have become widely available. This paper explores the innovative application of a customized ChatGPT model designed to assist new entrepreneurs in navigating and understanding emerging social and technological trends for new business development. Building on insights from Estonian Business School's and Estonian Business Angel Network's experience with young, enthusiastic start-up entrepreneurs, our custom GPT Develop Innovative Business for Changing World addresses the challenges commonly faced by early-stage entrepreneurs: not addressing relevant social trends, inadequate differentiation from competitors and underutilization of creativity tools. Designed as a pre-mentorship tool, this custom GPT guides entrepreneurs through identifying relevant trends, benchmarking against competing ideas, and applying creative thinking techniques like De Bono's lateral thinking, morphological analysis, and SCAMPER. Through interactive dialogue, users can develop preliminary business models and receive guidance on enhancing their ideas' uniqueness before engaging with human mentors. International testing with students and experts in entrepreneurship has refined the tool. Feedback from students in Estonia, France, and Czechia indicates its value in monitoring new social and technology trends, advancing creative differentiation from competitors, and minimizing AI “hallucinations” by grounding outputs in referenced sources. When AI asks students to choose trends relevant to their business development, French students prioritized trends reflecting the green agenda and healthy lifestyles. Estonian students were more often inspired by trends related to digitalization, blockchain, AI and social media. Learners who already had their own detailed business ideas suggested that the GPT should only present these trends that are relevant to their business idea context. However, this custom GPT logic is to encourage new entrepreneurs to consider a broader spectrum of social and technology trends at an early stage of business idea development. Custom GPT testing also revealed that students often do not follow the custom GPT suggestion to differentiate their business ideas from competitors by utilizing the results of creativity techniques demonstrated to users by this AI tool. Potential entrepreneurs are eager to find a fast track to the pro forma business plan. Custom GPTs offer a new paradigm for AI-assisted entrepreneurial education and qualitative research, bridging the gap between AI-supported tools and human mentorship in supporting young start-up entrepreneurs. More efforts are needed to develop critical comparisons of different information sources and to address cultural differences in prompt writing, when using large language models.

Keywords: Artificial intelligence, entrepreneurship education, creativity, critical thinking.