Santa Cruz County's Hephaestus Robotics team captured its first world title, winning the Ranger Class at the 2026 MATE ROV World Championship in Newfoundland — besting 47 high school teams from 13 countries after back-to-back third-place finishes.

Everyone "knows" Santa Cruz's new housing sits empty. The occupancy data would like a word: it's basically all full — mostly with people who already lived and worked here. Whoops, myth busted.

Our July 1 New Tech closed out the season with a new rotating format, six standout presenters, riverside networking, raffle prizes, and a packed house at River Row. See you September 9!

Venture capital has funded some of the most transformative companies in modern history. It has also torched billions of dollars on businesses that looked brilliant on a pitch deck but collapsed in the real world. The difference between the two outcomes is rarely about the idea. It almost always comes down to execution, discipline, and leadership.

A story about how a former Wall Street derivatives trader finally got the decision intelligence system her manufacturing company needed.

Professor Daniel Kim at UCSC has announced a partnership with Oxford Nanopore Technologies to advance RNA liquid biopsy for early cancer detection.

A ten-day California × Netherlands exchange brought global mobility leaders to the Central Coast to explore advanced air mobility, clean energy, infrastructure, and workforce development. The visit highlighted how Santa Cruz, Monterey Bay, DART, Joby, UCSC, Hartnell, and regional partners are helping build the systems needed to move next-generation flight from concept to real-world deployment.

Joby Aviation and Toyota are joining forces in a new joint venture to bring electric air mobility to the skies.

A team of 20 Santa Cruz County high schoolers just won the MATE ROV World Championship in Newfoundland — the latest chapter in a five-year run that's turned a sunny beach town into a global robotics dynasty.

A new Civil Grand Jury report reframes Santa Cruz County's 40-year corridor fight: the failure wasn't choosing between rail and trail, but making generational decisions without grounding them in engineering and financial reality.

X Academy's Team Hephaestus is competing at the 2026 MATE ROV World Championships in Newfoundland.

The fear is that AI replaces the artist. The better read is that it replaces friction — the blank page, the first draft, the forgettable middle. What it can't replace is judgment.

Frish Brandt—Letter Midwife and founder of Lasting Letters—leads "I Miss You," a guided letter-writing workshop at Tumbleweed Found on July 11th, 10 to noon. Slow down, reflect, and write the words you've been needing to say. Registration is limited.

At our latest CEO Works Luncheon, Kelsey Manne of Little Pineapple Collaborative reframed workplace conflict as a spectrum of opportunity—and gave leaders a practical toolkit for navigating it. Here's why you'll want to watch the full recording.

The Santa Cruz job market is quietly heating up, and these four companies are leading the charge.

Roadmap 4 Innovation (R4I) has been awarded Employment Training Panel (ETP) funding to help qualifying California manufacturers offset workforce training costs and invest in employee development.

Santa Cruz Ventures has made a follow-on investment in Dispatch Goods, its tenth portfolio company — a vote of confidence in the reusable-packaging pioneer just as California's landmark plastics law takes hold.

Santa Cruz-based Reservoir VC has had a landmark week: it acquired agriculture finance platform Contain, Inc. and welcomed its founder as a new General Partner.

Beloved Monterey Bay radio station 94.7FM KRML has a new owner that you may recognize.

Silicon Valley is still winning — record VC dollars, surging AI job postings, tech employment finally growing again. But a new economic report warns the region's strength is masking real cracks: a statewide jobs slump, falling immigration, and a federal debt bill that's quietly draining future growth.