The Monthly Beat - February '26 Edition
A recap of the most interesting Pittsburgh tech news from the past few weeks, upcoming local tech events, and extras for the days ahead.
Good morning! The snow piled up everywhere around the city is finally melting. Now that my pipes have unfrozen, I can finally get around to writing this blog. While everyone may have been staying in during this cold weather, Pittsburgh tech companies were on the move.
Let’s get into it.
What Happened the Past Few Weeks
Tech stocks have been getting cooked by AI fears, with Duolingo being the biggest loser from its 52-week high based on the above data from Deutsche Bank. A little over a year ago, I reported on how executives at Duolingo were saying “AI” a bunch, then selling all of their shares at an historically high price. In that post, I theorized that the selloff was a tacit acknowledgement from leadership that their stock was significantly overvalued from their “AI” posturing. We will likely never know whether the timing of this selloff was coincidental or intentional, but the market seems to have agreed that the stock was, in fact, overvalued. Could it come back? Is there any way to disable Lucy? Would love to hear your thoughts in the comments!
Wabtec expanded their operations in eastern India with a new service model that leverages existing Indian Railways infrastructure and staff. The company will be providing maintenance, supervision, material and warehouse management, shed control, logistics, and remote diagnostics to Indian Railways operators. Wabtec also landed a massive order from New York’s MTA for new hybrid locomotives loaded with the latest sensors and safety technology.
Niche.com quietly laid off a few employees, bringing its headcount back under 300 for the first time in several years. Discovered this initially through posts on LinkedIn and confirmed with sources. After its new college cost comparison tool was featured in the New York Times, the company is seeking to streamline its operations to become more profitable.
Aurora is now integrated with McLeod Software, allowing more carriers to use its autonomous trucks to handle shipments. McLeod makes Transportation Management System (TMS) software that allows users to manage and book trucking capacity. Now, anyone who has a subscription to Aurora Driver can “tender” (today I learned what this means in trucking, and it’s not referring to delicious fried chicken) shipments in their McLeod TMS to be handled by autonomous trucks, removing the need for separate web portals, etc.
Technical.ly published some pretty great Pittsburgh-based interview pieces this past month, including one of the City of Pittsburgh’s CIO who resigned after 8 years. Favorite quote from this one was, “Pittsburgh is not able to keep up with the salaries for high-tech IT workers… The further behind they get with that, the harder it becomes to fill those positions.” Max Polec, a well-known local startup coach who is now leaving Pittsburgh, also did an interview in which he clapped back at local critics, saying “I started my first business at 15. I’m 30 now. Do the math.” Finally, local CEO Cara Jones, who is using AI to fight human trafficking at Marinus Analytics, did an interview sharing her story. Her advice to founders: “As long as you’re making forward progress, and you’re making an impact, stay the course.”
Pittsburgh tech companies had a good showing at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show. According to the Post-Gazette, Strip District-based Aurora, Canonsburg-based Ansys/Synopsys, Bloomfield Robotics in Lawrenceville, North Side-based Bucket Robotics, Hazelwood-based Motional, Squirrel Hill-based Hellbender, and Westinghouse in Cranberry were all in attendance. I would also like to be in attendance next year if anyone has an extra ticket?
Speaking of the Post-Gazette, on a meta note, I had the chance to attend this Pittsburgh Tomorrow event about the future of Pittsburgh journalism with the Post-Gazette announcing its closure. The event featured a panel of local leaders from the journalism community—WESA, The Trib, Public Source, Pittsburgh Courier, and more represented. I’ll have some more thoughts to share on this in an upcoming post, but looks like a billionaire is already swooping in to buy the Post-Gazette.
Local open source guru Chad Whitacre shared a post and documentary he released last month on how open source software can help fight tyranny. A great and hopeful watch!
Last but definitely not least, local physician Desmond Daley published a fantastic opinion piece entitled Pittsburgh’s AI skepticism isn’t ignorance. It’s memory. I’m not going to spoil it here, but it’s a must-read.
For the Days Ahead
If you’ve been messing with AI lately, you’ve probably heard of Claude Skills. Local AI technologist Ian Cook built a hub for Claude Skills made by Pittsburghers: Skills N’At! You can try other people’s Skills that have already been uploaded or even submit your own on the site. Give it a try!
Got no plans TONIGHT? There’s an open mic night for local tech founders, researchers, and technologists to pitch companies and share ideas at that new coworking space in Hazelwood Green. Sign up here.
Looking for a weekly hangout with other folks who are interested in technology and entrepreneurship? Technically Coffee is a great one, 8am every Friday at Bakery Square. Sign up here.
Monday, February 23rd, Code & Supply is hosting their recurring Build Night, a time to get together with other folks and build stuff with code at Avenu: Meyran. Sign up here.
Wednesday, February 25th, PyData Pittsburgh’s first event of 2026 will be Characterizing the Transient Universe with the Pitt-Google Alert Broker. Learn about cutting-edge AI applications in astronomy while exploring one of Pittsburgh’s most fascinating scientific landmarks, the Allegheny Observatory (tours will be offered after the talk)! I was at last year’s talk at the observatory, and I cannot recommend this enough. Sign up here.
Coming up on March 26th, PyData has another event at CoLab18 called An Unexpected Journey: Life Lessons from Conquering Tesla Solar with Python, a talk about “the unexpected lessons you learn when you trust your instincts and refuse to accept ‘it’s working fine’ as an answer.” Sign up here.
Do YOU have an event you’d like to share on this very newsletter? Please hit me up!
That’s it for this month. Have a great rest of your week!
—Austin
Love Cara's quote, “As long as you’re making forward progress, and you’re making an impact, stay the course.”