Portland Oregon startups, tech, news, events, jobs, and community

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

Flipboard acquires Graze, the tool for building your own social algorithm

Flipboard has acquired Graze, a Portland startup that lets creators build, tune and monetise custom social feeds without writing code, mainly on Bluesky. Graze says it has delivered more than 41 billion posts to 12 million users since forming 21 months ago.

You know those times where you accidentally do the wrong thing and then — upon realizing your mistake — work to begin repairing that mistake…? And then you realize that it’s going to take exponentially more effort and heartache than if you’d just simply done nothing…? Welcome to the ongoing conversation around Qualified Small Business Stock taxation in Oregon.

I could feel it. You needed some more good news today. Luckily Senators Ron Wyden and Jeff Merkley and Representative Suzanne Bonamici are working hard at the Federal level to make that good news happen. To the tune of ~$6 million in support of Oregon startups.

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

Why Bootstrapped Businesses Are More Relevant Than Ever 

For entrepreneurs without the luxury of risk capital, product-market fit can’t be an odyssey. It has to be a starting point. Much of the global economy has been built this way. The path may take longer than the VC “go big or go home” approach, but many small companies scale into middle market businesses, and a few of the best find their way to market leadership, even in tech. Consider Atlassian and Basecamp. For every VC-backed startup, there are hundreds of bootstrapped founders building profitable businesses without any outside investment.

Came across a new effort from long-time startup community member George DeCarlo. It’s called Hatchable. And it’s built by Woobox, the same local shop that’s hosted more than 10 million sites over the past 15 years. Best of all? It seems to be striking a chord with all of the cool AI kids.

One of the most challenging timelines in the Portland startup community is the length of time between founding a company and successfully reaching a liquidity event for that effort. An acquisition, an IPO, a PE deal… something that rewards the founders for their efforts. So when a local startup manages to start, grow, and exit in a matter of years — rather than a matter of decades — it’s worth taking note. Bluesky feed and AT Proto startup Graze has been acquired by Flipboard.

You gotta love the entrepreneur support organizations. No. You do. That wasn’t a question. They keep working and working to help founders and startups. Almost nonstop. I mean, it seems like Oregon Entrepreneurs Network Angel Oregon Tech event was just last week… What’s that…? Oh. It was…? Well, I guess they’re bored now because OEN Angel Oregon applications are now open for the next cohorts of CPG, Life & Bio, and Tech.