Pittsburgh's tech scene has seen quite the year.
It's one that started off with a significant amount of capital raise announcements from local startups that landed deals with firms near and far, equipping these young companies with the necessary capital to further build up and scale out their tech-powered offerings.
In January, RoadRunner Recycling and Watt Fuel Cell closed on a $70 million Series D and a $67.3 million funding round, respectively. Then in February, video game coaching platform Metafy landed a $25 million Series A, which preceded the March raises of Gecko Robotics' $73 million Series C, Apollo Neuroscience's $15 million Series A and ForAllSecure's $21 million Series B. Late spring and early summer saw Free Market Health raise a $13.5 million Series A, OtterTune's raise of a $12 million Series A, Gridwise's raise of a $12.7 million Series A and Novasenta's raise of a $40 million in Series A in July.
By August, the tide began to turn, but not before Seegrid and Abridge inked their deals; $30 million as part of a Series C funding round and $12.5 million in Series A funding, respectively. It was also during this time that Seegrid announced it laid off about 90 workers.
Seegrid's layoffs came after the July layoffs issued by Strip District-based Argo AI, which cut about 150 jobs or about 5% of its workforce. It ultimately wasn't enough; the company shut down completely in October after its main financial backers, Ford Motor Co. and Volkswagen AG, opted to no longer support the Pittsburgh company, with most of its assets and some of its workforce going to these two automakers.
Then days later, South Side-based vertical farming robotics startup Fifth Season shuttered operations, the details for which have yet to be shared publicly.
The shutdown of Argo and Fifth Season and the news surrounding it dominated the interest of Pittsburgh Inno readers the most this year, encompassing the majority of the publication's most-read stories of 2022.
Here's a look back at all the top stories:
- Vertical farming robotics startup Fifth Season shuts down
- ‘A wake-up call’ for Pittsburgh’s tech scene after Argo AI’s shutdown
- Ford considering take over of Argo AI's footprint in Pittsburgh following shutdown and layoff of 679 workers
- Duolingo's A/B testing use is causing users to flock to its premium model, now at 3.3 million accounts
- Carnegie Mellon University to launch its own space command center for upcoming lunar trip
