kirkland-washington
(4)
The Tiny Firm Behind the Big Technology Story
JLM Partners built a communications business by staying small, learning the plumbing of broadband and showing up wherever complicated technology needs a plain-English story.
3xEquity Turned the Recruiter Cold-Call Into a Silent Auction for Advisors
The Kirkland firm gets financial advisors competing offers from 200-plus broker-dealers in a few days - anonymously, and without paying a dime. In May 2026, Elite Consulting Partners bought it.
General Robotics
General Robotics is a Kirkland, Washington startup building general-purpose intelligence for robots. Its flagship GRID platform delivers modular, composable AI skills - perception, reasoning, and control - that deploy across humanoids, arms, quadrupeds, wheeled and aerial robots in minutes, without local GPUs. Founded in 2023 (originally Scaled Foundations) by a team of ex-Microsoft AI researchers, the company argues that robot intelligence emerges from composing many reusable skills rather than from one ever-larger model.
Optimal
Optimal is a Kirkland, Washington education-data company that uses independent research to help people make better decisions about college and careers. Founded in 2004 by former Microsoft manager Sung Rhee as SR Education Group, it rebranded to Optimal in 2020. Through its consumer sites - OnlineU, GradReports and SwitchUp - it publishes college rankings built on alumni salaries, manually researched tuition, and tens of thousands of verified student reviews, aiming to make the real return on an education visible before students take on debt.