Pittsburgh weekly roundup: $300k innovation prize; Hire a student fellow; Anduril hires locally

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This week in Pittsburgh, mayoral candidates talk about Pittsburgh’s tech future, Duolingo cuts jobs and hires AI to replace them and more.

Read on for Technical.ly’s weekly roundup of top news in the region.

📰 News Incubator: What else to know

• Technical.ly’s 2025 Pittsburgh RealLIST Connectors list includes 20 people organizing popular meetup events, linking technologists to their next jobs and helping startup founders find resources. [Technical.ly]

•  Applications are now open for the annual BNY UpPrize Social Innovation Challenge, which offers a combined $300,000 in prize money for early-stage and advanced-stage ventures in Southwestern Pennsylvania. [Innovation Works]

• Lovelace AI, a Bakery Square-based company specializing in using AI to synthesize data for high-risk decisions, announced it closed a seed round of an undisclosed amount, led by New York firm RRE Ventures. [Technical.ly] 

• Pittsburgh nonprofits, startups and small businesses can now apply for a fully funded student fellow through Grove City College’s E+I Fellows Program, an 8-week internship program happening this fall. [E+I Fellows]

• Three years after the New Economy Collaborative of Southwestern Pennsylvania received $62.7 million in federal funding, it continues to use the funds to invest in robotics and automation to tackle workforce shortages, but Pittsburgh can still learn from similar efforts underway in Nebraska. [Technical.ly] 

• California-based defense tech company Anduril is hiring for several autonomous software roles in Pittsburgh, despite not currently having a physical presence in the city. The company develops autonomous weapons used by Ukraine. [Pittsburgh Biz Times]

🗓️ On the Calendar

• Attend Code & Coffee’s monthly meetup on May 10 at Prototype PGH. The inclusive coding group invites attendees of all skill levels to practice coding, meet new friends and get help if needed. [More info]

• Join the Pittsburgh Technology Council on May 14 for a timely discussion on how recent federal actions are reshaping diversity, equity and inclusion programs. Legal experts and HR leaders will break down the changes, their implications and how to respond. [Attend]

• Gather with other Pittsburghers who are working to shape the future of AI adoption in the city at the monthly meetup group Steel City AI Innovators on May 14. [More info]

• PyCon US, the largest and longest-running annual gathering for the community using and developing the open-source Python programming language, is coming to Pittsburgh’s David L. Lawrence Convention Center from May 14 to 22. [Register] 

• Automation control company ECI is hosting a Tech Connect Hiring Event on May 15 to meet local professionals as the company recruits for a variety of open positions. [Details here]