Travis Rush, co-founder and CEO of Reperio Health. (Reperio Photo) Travis Rush grew up in the tiny seaside town of Gold Beach in Southern Oregon. With a population of only 1,576 — as was proudly proclaimed on the sign coming into town — healthcare resources there were limited. The nearest medical lab was over an hour a way. Rush is now CEO and co-founder of Reperio Health, a Portland, Ore.-based startup providing in-home health screenings, essentially bringing basic lab services to people in small communities like Gold Beach and in major metros alike. Reperio recently raised $14 million in new ..read more

Charging stations at Seattle’s Shilshole Bay Marina. (GeekWire Photo / Kurt Schlosser) Washington is leaning into the fight against climate change. Seattle-area tech giants Microsoft and Amazon have set ambitious carbon reduction targets and invested millions to meet those goals. The state is home to a multitude of climate tech startups tackling batteries, nuclear power, green aviation, hydrogen fuel and other clean energy challenges. Elected leaders have vowed to cut the state’s carbon emissions and passed groundbreaking policies to hit those targets. An initiative on Washington’s ballot this ..read more

Cynthia Williams, soon to be former president of Wizards of the Coast. (Wizards of the Coast image) A new SEC filing reveals that Cynthia Williams plans to step down as president at Hasbro-owned game company Wizards of the Coast. No specific reason has been publicly offered for Williams’ departure, which is effective April 26. “We’re excited for Cynthia to take the next step in her career and grateful for the contributions she has made in her more than two years at Wizards and Hasbro,” a Hasbro representative told GeekWire. “We wish her the absolute best in her next endeavor. We have started t ..read more

NanoString’s GeoMX Digital Spatial Profiler was at the heart of a patent lawsuit filed by 10x Genomics. (NanoString Image) NanoString announced Wednesday that it will be acquired by Bruker, ending the company’s restructuring process that included a Chapter 11 bankruptcy plan. Bruker, a Massachusetts-based publicly traded life sciences research and diagnostic giant founded in 1960, will pay $392.6 million to buy Seattle-based NanoString. The deal is expected to close next month. NanoString said in February that it initiated a Chapter 11 bankruptcy plan and was exploring a potential sale followi ..read more

Shein, the fast-fashion e-commerce retailer that recently announced plans to open an office in Bellevue, Wash., is hosting a pop-up experience in Seattle next week. The event will take place April 26-29 at the O’Shea Building at the corner of Fifth Avenue and Pine Street in downtown Seattle. Shein plans to offer a variety of merchandise for women and men, including clothing, shoes, handbags, and accessories. An online promotion for the pop-up promises “1,000+ spring styles” and fashions from Shein collections including Essnce, EZwear, Sxy, Glowmode and more. New and existing Shein Club member ..read more

Plants line the living wall at Climate Pledge Arena. Amazon bought naming rights to the arena, helping tout its commitment to reach net-zero carbon by 2040. (GeekWire Photo / Kurt Schlosser) More than 100 companies, tribal groups, union organizations, environmental nonprofits and political groups are backing a campaign to defeat a November ballot initiative that would scuttle Washington state’s most impactful climate policy. Amazon, Microsoft, REI, BP America, the Seattle Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce and the Clean Tech Alliance, as well as climate startups including First Mode, Myno Carbon ..read more

Sarah Bird. (LinkedIn Photo) Sarah Bird, the Seattle tech veteran who led SEO software startup Moz for seven years, is the new CEO of Canvas, a software company that builds technology for remodeling, architecture and interior design. A former lawyer who started at Moz as chief operating officer in 2007, Bird left the company in November 2021 after it was acquired by J2 Global. She spent almost two years on a sabbatical that she said was filled with travel, startup investing, volunteering, remodeling her home and more. She also got engaged, she wrote on LinkedIn on Wednesday. Feeling “powered u ..read more

Validated, a Seattle startup that uses AI to help companies figure out what product features and messaging resonates with customers, raised more investment and released a new product. The company this week launched Taglines, which ingests info about a business and generates ads. The product can run the ads and discover which messaging gets more attention. Beauty brands including Sio and Birthdate are using Taglines. Validated recently raised an additional $800,000, after announcing a $1.2 million round in February. The company is led by co-founders Rahul Bhardwaj and Zean Tsoi. Bhardwaj previ ..read more

Dilip Kumar, VP of AWS applications, at an Amazon event in 2022. (GeekWire Photo / Todd Bishop) Amazon’s grocery technology has been in the news a lot over the past couple of weeks, following layoffs in the Amazon Web Services group responsible for the company’s physical store checkout and identity services. The company is shifting away from “Just Walk Out” in its large grocery stores, which uses cameras and sensors to detect what people put in their carts, letting them avoid the checkout line. Instead, it’s focusing on Dash Carts, which also let shoppers skip the line but currently require sc ..read more

Gurdeep Singh Pall. Technology leader Gurdeep Singh Pall, a longtime Microsoft executive, is joining experience management technology company Qualtrics as its first president of artificial intelligence strategy. Pall left Microsoft last fall after a 33-year career that spanned from Windows NT to Microsoft Teams, Lync, Skype, and Bing. He ultimately served as Microsoft’s head of business AI and product incubations. As a Seattle-based executive for Qualtrics, he will lead the company’s AI initiatives, focusing on vision and strategy, and the prototyping of new AI technologies and features in its ..read more