June 05, 2015
Opinion: The AI white collar displacement debate — doom or delay?
March 23, 2026
Editor’s note: GeekWire publishes guest opinions to foster informed discussion and highlight a diversity of perspectives on issues shaping the tech and startup community. If you’re interested in submitting a guest column, email us at tips@geekwire.com. Submissions are reviewed by our editorial team...
Report: Helion is working on a massive fusion power deal with OpenAI
March 23, 2026
Helion Energy’s Polaris fusion demonstration reactor operating with tritium and deuterium fuel. (Helion Photo) The Seattle-area fusion company Helion Energy is negotiating a deal to supply OpenAI with massive amounts of energy, Axios reported Monday. The deal under discussion would have...
10 startups chosen for Plug and Play’s third Seattle-area accelerator cohort
March 23, 2026
Startup founders who pitched for a chance to join the latest Plug and Play Cohort. (Photo courtesy of Plug and Play) Plug and Play has selected the 10 startups that will take part in its third Seattle-area accelerator cohort as the program marks its one-year anniversary in the region. The...
Sci-fi epic ‘Project Hail Mary’ gives Amazon MGM Studios its best opening ever with $80.6M
March 23, 2026
Ryan Gosling set out to save the planet, and he may just save Amazon’s movie-making credibility. “Project Hail Mary,” the sci-fi epic that stars Gosling as a scientist sent on a mission to save Earth from extinction, grossed $80.6 million in its opening weekend, marking the biggest box...
AWS at 20*: Inside the rise of Amazon’s cloud empire, and what’s at stake in the AI era
March 22, 2026
Jeff Bezos framed this copy of a 2006 BusinessWeek cover, reflecting Wall Street’s skepticism about AWS. (Jeff Bezos via X, May 2022) In the early days of Amazon Web Services, technical evangelist Jeff Barr was putting in long hours on the road, pitching a novel concept: rent computing power for...
Week in Review: Most popular stories on GeekWire for the week of March 15, 2026
March 22, 2026
Get caught up on the latest technology and startup news from the past week. Here are the most popular stories on GeekWire for the week of March 15, 2026. Sign up to receive these updates every Sunday in your inbox by subscribing to our GeekWire Weekly email newsletter. Most popular stories on...
51,600 more satellites? Blue Origin adds another twist to the data center space race with Project Sunrise
March 21, 2026
An artist’s conception shows a constellation of satellites in orbit. (OneWeb Illustration) Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin space venture is asking the Federal Communications Commission for authority to send up to 51,600 data center satellites into low Earth orbit, signaling its entry into an...
Why Amazon’s second shot at a smartphone might not be as crazy as it sounds
March 21, 2026
An artist’s conception of Amazon’s Leo satellite constellation. The satellite internet initiative sits in the same division as Amazon’s new phone project, raising the question of whether Amazon could eventually provide its own wireless connectivity. (Amazon Illustration) When Reuters reported...
Microsoft Copilot shakeup, Amazon phone ambitions, and pushing Claude to the limits of LinkedIn
March 21, 2026
This week on the GeekWire Podcast: Amazon is working on a new smartphone, code-named “Transformer,” more than a decade after the Fire Phone debacle, according to Reuters. We dig into the connection to a past GeekWire scoop: former Microsoft Xbox leader J Allard joined Amazon’s devices team...
Report: Amazon is making another phone, this time for the AI era
March 20, 2026
Different this time? Jeff Bezos unveils the Amazon Fire Phone in June 2014. (GeekWire File Photo / Todd Bishop) Amazon is working on another phone. That’s the jaw-dropper from Reuters this morning, reporting that the company is developing a new smartphone codenamed “Transformer” within its...
Seattle’s biotech scene is world-class — Life Science Washington is teaching it how to brag
March 20, 2026
Marc Cummings, president and CEO of Life Science Washington, speaking at a one-day forum focused on AI-driven biotech that was held in Seattle in October 2025. (Life Science Washington Photo) Seattle is already a top global hub for AI-driven biotechnology. It just doesn’t know how to say...
Tech Moves: Carbon Robotics’ new CFO; Microsoft gaming GM goes to Netflix; Nordstrom gets VP of AI
March 20, 2026
Kevan Kryslter, CFO of Carbon Robotics. (Carbon Robotics Photo) Agtech company Carbon Robotics appointed Kevan Krysler as chief financial officer. The Seattle startup, known for zapping weeds with lasers, reports it has surpassed $100 million in annual revenue. Carbon has also been name-checked...
Seahawks star Marshawn Lynch had one Amazon exec on edge when he took the wheel of Treasure Truck
March 20, 2026
Amazon’s beloved Treasure Truck finally ran out of road in 2022, after about a seven-year run. But Doug Herrington, CEO of Worldwide Amazon Stores and an early champion of the deals-on-wheels concept, once worried that Marshawn Lynch was going to crash the party just as it got rolling. In...
Sidewalk scooter riders, beware: AI-powered ‘Lime Vision’ will soon call you out
March 20, 2026
A Lime e-scooter rider cruises past on the sidewalk in Seattle’s South Lake Union neighborhood, home to Amazon HQ. New tech on the scooters coming this summer will generate audible and app alerts warning riders to move to a safer riding area. (GeekWire Photo / Todd Bishop) Lime scooters in...
Bluesky discloses $100M Series B round raised last year
March 19, 2026
Decentralized social network Bluesky revealed on Thursday that it raised $100 million in a Series B round led by Bain Capital Crypto, with participation from Alumni Ventures, Anthos Capital, Bloomberg Beta, Knight Foundation and True Ventures. The round closed in April 2025. Bluesky previously...
GeekWire Awards: Billion-dollar deals, rare IPO, pharma pact, and mega-round vie for Deal of the Year
March 19, 2026
The finalists for Deal of the Year at the 2026 GeekWire Awards. Clockwise from top left: Temporal co-founders Samar Abbas and Maxim Fateev; Protect AI co-founders Badar Ahmed, Daryan Dehghanpisheh, and Ian Swanson; Kestra Medical Technologies’ cardiac monitoring device; the ribbon cutting at...
City of Seattle awards $455k in ‘Technology Matching Fund’ grants to support digital equity efforts
March 19, 2026
The TMF program is a partnership between the City of Seattle and community organizations improving digital literacy and skills for underserved communities. (City of Seattle Photo) The City of Seattle is awarding $455,000 in Technology Matching Fund grants to help support 11 community...
The rise of vertical AI agents — and the startups racing to build them
March 19, 2026
San Francisco startup Nooks hosted a panel in Seattle last month focused on vertical AI agents. From left: Chinmay Barve, vice president of engineering at Nooks; Nikhil Cheerla, CTO at Nooks; Sharbani Roy, VP of AI Services at Arm; and Joe Duffy, CEO and founder at Pulumi. (GeekWire Photo / Taylor...
From computer to lab to market: Nobel winner David Baker lands $7M for new protein program
March 19, 2026
Research underway at UW Medicine’s Institute for Protein Design. (GeekWire Photo / Lisa Stiffler) Nobel Laureate David Baker will lead a new University of Washington initiative that’s launching with $7 million to develop designer enzymes and proteins to solve challenges in medicine, technology...
Got space junk? Portal and Paladin team up to create an orbital trash disposal service
March 19, 2026
An artist’s conception shows Portal Space Systems’ Starburst spacecraft at left and its larger Supernova platform in the distance at right, both outfitted with Paladin Space’s Triton payload for orbital debris tracking and removal. (Portal Space Systems Illustration) Bothell, Wash.-based Portal...
Portland cybersecurity startup Eclypsium raises $25M to secure AI infrastructure
March 19, 2026
Eclypsium co-founders Yuriy Bulygin, left, and Alex Bazhaniuk. (Eclypsium Photo) Eclypsium, a Portland-based cybersecurity startup, raised $25 million in new funding to expand its hardware and firmware security platform. The round was led by PEAK6 Strategic Capital, with participation from...
AI enters the chat: New Seattle dating app relies on tech to facilitate meaningful human connections
March 19, 2026
Screen grabs from the Lamu app show various interactions with AI, including, from left, answering profile questions, receiving a “love score” and completed profile, and discussing date location options. (Lamu Images) Ada Jin was suffering from dating app fatigue. She was tired of the constant...
Compass drops lawsuit against Zillow over home-listing policy
March 18, 2026
(BigStock Photo) This story originally appeared on Real Estate News. One of the biggest lawsuits to capture the real estate industry’s attention over the past year has come to an abrupt end. Compass International Holdings announced Wednesday that it is dismissing the lawsuit it filed last...
Microsoft nixes NDAs with local governments worldwide when deploying data centers
March 18, 2026
Microsoft’s Fairwater data center near Atlanta is part of the company’s broader AI expansion. (Microsoft Photo) Amid widespread blowback against the spread of data centers, Microsoft on Wednesday announced it is abandoning its practice of secrecy with local governments when deploying new...
Backed by Nvidia, Seattle’s Phaidra targets data center overheating with proactive AI
March 18, 2026
Phaidra leaders, from left: CTO Vedavyas Panneershelvam, CEO Jim Gao, and COO Katherine Hoffman. (Phaidra Photo) Phaidra, a startup using artificial intelligence to make data center operations more energy efficient, this week announced key collaborations with Nvidia, CoreWeave and Applied...
Seattle area ranks No. 3 among U.S. metros in new study measuring AI growth around jobs, pay and more
March 18, 2026
Part of the Seattle skyline as seen from the waterfront. (GeekWire Photo / Kurt Schlosser) Seattle ranks No. 3 nationally in AI industry growth according to a new study that measures employment, salaries, job concentration and more in metropolitan areas across the U.S. The new report from...
GeekWire 200 update: A new No. 1 and plenty of newcomers join list of top Pacific Northwest tech startups
March 18, 2026
There’s a new No. 1. Fusion power company Helion Energy has taken the top spot in the latest update of the GeekWire 200, our quarterly ranking of the top privately held technology startups in the Pacific Northwest. Helion replaced Highspot, which announced a merger with Seismic in a...
From Sydney to South Lake Union: VR startup Vantari brings its ‘flight simulator for healthcare’ to Seattle
March 18, 2026
Vantari co-CEO Vijay Paul, COO Jagrup Kahlon, and co-CEO Nishant Krishnanathan. (Vantari Photos) Vantari, a virtual reality startup that builds “flight simulator” software for doctors and nurses, has officially moved its headquarters to Seattle as it ramps up work with health systems and device...
It’s time to vote for the GeekWire Awards finalists! Help us select the best in Pacific Northwest tech
March 18, 2026
The team from Auger accepts the Startup of the Year trophy at the 2025 GeekWire Awards. (GeekWire File Photo / Dan DeLong) Boot up the robot trophies, it’s time to vote for the finalists for the 2026 GeekWire Awards! This is your chance to help us honor the top innovators and entrepreneurs in...
Microsoft hires employees from Cove, a small Sequoia-backed AI startup that helps teams collaborate
March 17, 2026
The Cove team. (Photo via Cove) Cove, a Silicon Valley startup that helps workers collaborate while using AI agents, announced Tuesday that its team is joining Microsoft. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Cove will shut down its product on April 1. “When we started Cove, we set out...
Tech Moves: Ex-Microsoft leader takes nonprofit CEO role; Google vet joins LinkedIn; Amazon leaders depart
March 17, 2026
Steven VanRoekel. (ESP Photo) — Steven VanRoekel, a longtime former Microsoft leader and U.S. chief information officer under President Obama, is now CEO of Earth Species Project (ESP). The non-profit research lab is using artificial intelligence to better understand animal communication in...
Microsoft revamps Copilot structure, elevating former Snap exec as Suleyman shifts to AI models
March 17, 2026
Mustafa Suleyman, CEO of Microsoft AI, will shift his focus to building frontier AI models and leading the company’s superintelligence efforts under a reorganization announced Tuesday. (GeekWire File Photo / Kevin Lisota) Microsoft is reorganizing its Copilot organization, unifying its consumer...
Cybersecurity startup Native, led by AWS vets with roots in Seattle, comes out of stealth with $42M
March 17, 2026
Native CEO Amit Megiddo. (LinkedIn Photo) A new cloud security startup called Native came out of stealth mode on Tuesday, announcing $42 million in funding to build what it describes as a “control plane” for cloud security. The funding includes a $31 million Series A round led by Ballistic...
Amazon rolls out 1-hour and 3-hour options in latest offering of ever-faster deliveries
March 17, 2026
Amazon’s new one-hour and three-hour delivery options as seen next to products. (Amazon Image) Amazon is speeding up delivery times again. The company announced Tuesday that it is now offering one-hour and three-hour delivery options on more than 90,000 products to cities and towns across...
Ramp acquires Juno, a corporate travel expense startup backed by Madrona
March 17, 2026
Juno co-founders Devon Tivona (left) and Sam Felsenthal. (Juno Photo) Fintech giant Ramp announced the acquisition of Juno, a startup founded in 2024 that built a corporate travel platform to help manage non-employee expenses. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Juno will maintain its...
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