Most Popular Posts

How an AirTag planted by a reporter led to a secret Amazon site where old books are cut apart and scanned

404 Media put an Apple AirTag in a rare book and tracked it to an Amazon warehouse in Las Vegas, where a team cuts the bindings off books and scans the pages. The reporting method has roots in a Seattle non-profit group. Read More

We’ve entered Seattle’s Third Act

A year after GeekWire asked where Seattle’s superstar AI startups were, two local venture capitalists offer an answer: they’re here, but they build rockets, geothermal plants and autonomous off-road vehicles rather than software. A guest opinion from Ascend’s Nate Bek and Plug and Play’s Ben Eisinger. Read More

Qualtrics cuts jobs in Seattle, Utah and overseas as it absorbs $6.75B acquisition

Qualtrics laid off employees across Seattle, Provo and international offices Wednesday, three months after closing its $6.75 billion acquisition of Press Ganey Forsta. The company declined to disclose how many jobs were cut, but a WARN notice reviewed by GeekWire indicates at least 50 cuts were made at its Seattle headquarters. Read More

Anduril exits Seattle shipyard following canceled Navy program and omission from new warship list

After the U.S. Navy abruptly canceled a key unmanned warship program, defense giant Anduril quietly vacated its shipyard site on Seattle’s Lake Washington Ship Canal—even as its broader regional footprint continues to surge toward 1,000 local engineers. Read More

Internal memo: Eight execs out at Expedia Group in AI-driven shakeup

Expedia Group is parting ways with at least eight vice presidents and senior vice presidents as it reorganizes its product and technology organization around AI, according to an internal memo obtained by GeekWire. The memo from the company’s product and technology chiefs also names five leaders who were promoted. Read More

Tech Moves: AWS data leader jumps to Oracle; Seattle Children’s names new CIO; Zillow’s new legal chief

An AWS director who ran the launch of Oracle Database@AWS has joined Oracle. Also in this edition: Seattle Children’s names a Stanford informatics leader as CIO, Zillow fills a newly created chief legal and policy role and a former Convoy executive is Uber Freight’s new product chief. Read More

Inside Anduril’s AI warfighting buildup: Defense giant sees a path to 1,000 Seattle-area engineers

GeekWire toured Anduril’s unmarked Bellevue office, where the defense company is building augmented reality glasses, digital night vision and edge computing hardware for the U.S. military. Senior vice president Tom Keane says the regional engineering workforce could easily grow from 560 people to 1,000 in the not-too-distant future. Read More

North America’s biggest book sorter just opened in the Seattle area

The King County Library System opened a $5.2 million sorting installation in Renton that handles the 25,000 items moving through its 50 libraries each day. Robotic arms destack totes every 15 seconds and route materials into 186 delivery chutes. Read More

Etzioni on AI: An Opinionated Glossary of AI

Everyone in tech says things like LLM, open weights, RAG and agent; far fewer could define precisely what they all mean. Oren Etzioni sorts out about 30 AI terms in plain English, with a blunt verdict on each and one novel phrase he believes isn’t used enough. Read More

University of Washington and Seattle biotech win $245M patent judgment against Guardant

A Seattle biotech built on University of Washington research has won a $245 million patent judgment against Guardant Health over DNA sequencing technology, with the court also ordering ongoing royalties through 2033. Read More

Former Microsoft product manager launches bid to end clock change in Washington state, Congress or not

Scott Thurlow spent 32 years at Microsoft dreading the twice-yearly time change, and the “meeting chaos” it brought across time zones and countries. Weeks after retiring, he launched a campaign to end Washington’s clock changes without waiting for Congress, with a 2028 ballot initiative as the backup if lawmakers won’t act. Read More

Wizards of the Coast reveals first look at ‘Warlock,’ the next video game based on ‘Dungeons & Dragons’

Wizards of the Coast and its subsidiary Invoke Studios released a first-look gameplay trailer for Warlock: Dungeons & Dragons, a new open-world action game based upon the systems and setting of Wizards’ popular tabletop role-playing game. Read More

Seattle keeps No. 2 spot in closely watched tech talent ranking, with warning signs

The region held onto the No. 2 spot in CBRE’s annual tech talent scorecard, behind only the Bay Area. The report also flagged Seattle’s office vacancy rate, the highest of the 50 markets ranked, and a population of 20-somethings that shrank between 2019 and 2024, raising questions about the pipeline. Read More

Seattle weighs ban on ‘surveillance pricing’ at grocery stores, but will it save shoppers money?

A proposed Seattle ordinance would bar large grocers and delivery services from setting prices for individual shoppers based on their personal data. Industry groups say it will kill discounts, consumer advocates say it will stop retailers from charging people what their data says they’ll pay, and a City Council memo says the effect on grocery bills is hard to predict. Read More

Jeff Bezos remembers Dolly Parton — a recipient of his $100M ‘Courage and Civility’ award

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos joined the chorus of people who said they were touched by the life and work of Dolly Parton as he shared his condolences after the passing of the entertainment legend. Read More

Starbucks lays off 224 workers tied to Seattle HQ, including tech roles, as restructuring winds down

A new state filing shows Starbucks is cutting 224 more jobs tied to its Seattle headquarters, including technology positions and roles in the group that designs and builds its coffeehouses. The company says the layoffs complete restructuring work announced earlier this year rather than starting a new round of cuts. Read More

TikTok cuts 75 jobs in Seattle area, hitting e-commerce teams

TikTok is laying off 75 workers in Bellevue, most of them in TikTok Shop and Global E-Commerce roles, according to a notice filed with Washington state. It’s part of a steady stream of tech layoffs this year in the Seattle region. Read More

Tech layoffs hit Seattle housing market as pending sales post sharpest drop in the nation

According to a new report by Redfin, pending home sales in the Seattle area plunged 15.6% year-over-year in July. It’s the sharpest drop among major U.S. metropolitan areas as prospective buyers grapple with steep prices and job insecurity driven by recent tech-sector layoffs. Read More

Illustration: Satellite swinging around Earth

Starcloud raises $250M to support the creation of data center satellite network in league with Nvidia

Seattle-area space startup will use Nvidia’s next-gen chip on its own next-gen satellites for AI data processing. Read More

Homebuilding AI startup Digs raises $25.3M and partners with building products giant

Under the five-year agreement, Builders FirstSource will integrate Digs’ AI platform into its digital ecosystem, expanding tools for its 140,000 builder clients. Read More

BuyWander moves HQ from Spokane to Seattle area as retail-returns startup grows team to 325 people

BuyWander, the Spokane-born retail returns marketplace, has moved its headquarters to the Seattle area and grown to 325 employees as it expands nationally, adding four executives including two former Amazon leaders. Read More

‘I am very concerned’: Bill Gates says the world needs a plan to deal with AI, and he has three ideas to start

Bill Gates says the “turbulent AI era” has arrived, and the AI industry is crossing safety lines it once promised to respect. In a new essay and an interview with GeekWire, he lays out three ideas for managing what’s coming: new national and global institutions, a category of jobs reserved for humans, and a tax on AI and robots. Read More

Portal CEO Jeff Thornburg stretching arms out to show Starburst-1 satellite in Bothell lab

Inside the satellite factory: Portal Space Systems gets set for the debut of Starburst and Supernova

Get a sneak peek at the Seattle-area startup’s first Starburst satellite, plus an update on plans for the 2028 launch of its flagship Supernova spacecraft. Read More

Seattle’s AI weed wars: One startup maps them, another zaps them

Two Seattle-area startups are taking different approaches to an age-old farming problem: using AI to find weeds — and then eliminate them. TerraClear is mapping individual weeds across entire fields, while Carbon Robotics is using AI-powered lasers to zap them. Now, increasingly sophisticated AI models are giving both approaches a bigger opportunity: teaching machines to understand the farm itself. Read More

Want to know what Jeff Bezos brings to Liverpool FC? Study Amazon’s Leadership Principles

GeekWire co-founder John Cook talks with The Redmen TV about Jeff Bezos’ new ownership stake in Liverpool FC, his first major foray into global sports ownership, and what his business philosophy could mean for one of the world’s most storied soccer clubs. Read More