Amazon and Apple take on Elon Musk’s Starlink with Globalstar satellite deal


Amazon
isn’t just buying
Globalstar
— it’s inheriting
Apple
‘s satellite roadmap. The Seattle tech giant’s agreement to acquire the satellite operator behind iPhone’s Emergency SOS comes with a long-term deal for Amazon Leo to power satellite features on future iPhones and Apple Watches, giving Amazon a foothold against Elon Musk’s Starlink. Read more.

A former Amazon product manager is using AI to turn dense city council agendas and meeting minutes into plain-language briefings, with alerts tuned to each user’s interests, aiming to inspire people to show up to local government meetings.

Julien Clayton

has launched Next30Days in the Seattle region, with ambitions for a broader expansion. Read more.

“We live in an amazing time.”

Juan M. Lavista Ferres

, head of
Microsoft
’s AI for Good Lab, teaches computer science on the side and his fifth-grade students just wowed him with a vibe-coded tool they built. Their Braille 3D Generator turns text into printable, tactile 3D Braille models in seconds and has real-world usefulness. Read more. 

Seattle startup
Parsnipp
launched a platform to help brands track and improve how they show up in AI-generated answers from chatbots like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini, entering the fast-growing field known as Generative Engine Optimization, or GEO. Read more.


Ambassador Software
acquires
Humming
: Seattle customer engagement startup Ambassador just made its latest acquisition, snapping up Tacoma-based ad platform Humming. Looking ahead, Ambassador CEO

Geoff McDonald

says many AI startups are losing customers to the big AI labs, which will create future acquisition opportunities.
Zipwhip
co-founder

John Larson

is all in as Ambassador co-founder and chief strategy officer. Read more.

Opinion: If you listen to Democrats at both the state and national level today, capitalism is the enemy. The party that has labored to defend and perfect the American experiment — with opportunity, justice and equal treatment under the law for all — has either lost its mind, or its memory, for the motive force that makes those ideals possible. Read more from longtime Seattle investor and entrepreneur

Chris DeVore

.

Get your votes in for the 2026 GeekWire Awards: Help us select the leading entrepreneurs and innovators in Pacific Northwest tech ahead of our May 7 event in Seattle. Vote now!

  • Microsoft launched MAI-Image-2-Efficient, a lower-cost, higher-speed variant of its flagship text-to-image model that the company says delivers production-ready quality at nearly half the price. (VentureBeat, X)
  • Seattle AI hiring platform
    Humanly (humanly.io)
    acquired
    Anthill
    , a Chicago-based platform built to help companies connect with and support frontline employees. (Humanly)
  • Microsoft Xbox chief

    Asha Sharma

    says in an internal memo to employees that “Game Pass has become too expensive for players.” (The Verge)

  • Valve corporation
    ’s next Steam Controller looks imminent as import records show a massive “wireless PC controller” shipment — hinting the gamepad may land well before the Bellevue-based game company’s delayed 2026 Steam Machine. (TechRadar)

  • Google
    , Microsoft, and
    Meta
    continue setting ad‑tracking cookies even when users opt out via Global Privacy Control (GPC), potentially violating California privacy law, according to an independent audit. (404 Media)

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