When it rains, it pours. Earlier today we had no local AI hackathons planned. Now we have two. And they’re both happening on February 28, 2026. The first one is OpenClaw. The next one is an Anthropic Claude Code Hackathon. 

Always appreciate a good hackathon. And Portland often does a great job of rising to the occasion on hackathon opportunities. That’s why I’m excited to see that AI Tinkerers Portland is bringing us to the OpenClaw Global Unhackathon.

I remember when Oregon Venture Fund first published this framework. Because it provided transparent guidance on what they used to assess startups.

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

I’ve been nudging folks to see if anyone had any details about who was selected for the new Oregon AI Accelerator. And all of that nudging finally paid off. Curious — like I was — about who they selected…? Here’s the list of the 20 companies they picked.

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

One gripe I often hear about Portland folks is that we don’t tend to think big enough. It comes from a good place. Recognizing that we’ve got a ton of creativity, talent, and potential. We just don’t always have the risk tolerance. But that may be changing if AJ Green of the AI Collective has anything to say about it.

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

A few years back, Oregon Entrepreneurs Network — or OEN as the cool kids call it — rebooted their Angel Oregon program as part of an effort to connect early stage startups with early stage capital to help underwrite their efforts. It started as Angel Food, an OEN Angel Oregon program focused on food and beverage. It continued to build on that foundation with Angel Oregon Tech and Angel Oregon Life & Bioscience. And now, it’s expanding the program again.

When Dayo launched, they were very much focused on helping all of us reduce the amount of time we spend on social media with a very simple premise: Stop doom scrolling and get stuff. Now, they’ve refocused those efforts to help parents prevent kids from spending too much time on line. But they still get stuff for doing so.

We’ve all doomscrolled enough through the “doom loop” jibber jabber about our region. It’s nice to see others taking a more positive spin on the potential of the Silicon Forest. (Especially as we appear to have the early indicators of a hardware renaissance happening around here.) 

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

Post pandemic, we saw a number of beloved local events reboot. But we’ve never seen one quite this big. Portland Women in Technology (PDXWIT) — one of the largest and most beloved tech organizations in the community is back. And it’s holding a gathering on January 27, 2026.

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

People always ask me, “What is the one ‘must attend’ event in the Portland tech community…?” And while there are awards shows and pitch competitions galore, if I’m forced to only pick one, it’s actually pretty easy: 

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

I’ve been talking about the hardware renaissance that’s beginning to take shape around here. You see, as AI computing resources become more and more scarce, I hypothesize that we’re going to see people working to advance the technology to make things more efficient and effective. And a local startup helmed by Intel alums is definitely running that playbook. AheadComputing just raised $30 million bringing it to $53 million raised in total.

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

I keep saying it. Agility Robotics deserves more attention. Here’s another perspective on why: If Oregon’s 2025 VC numbers look better to you, it’s largely because of Agility, according to Mike Rogoway at The Oregonian.

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

Here’s a roundup of interesting startup links I came across today:

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