Episode Details

What happens when you stop building technology for the lab and start building it for the people working in some of the toughest environments imaginable?

On this episode of TechVibe Radio, Gecko Robotics founder and CEO Jake Loosararian joins Pittsburgh Technology Council President and CEO Audrey Russo for a wide-ranging conversation about entrepreneurship, industrial innovation and why Pittsburgh gives Gecko a powerful advantage.

Loosararian traces Gecko's roots back to a Pennsylvania power plant, where he saw workers risking their lives to inspect aging infrastructure with outdated tools. That experience sparked an idea: build robots that can go where people shouldn't have to, gather critical real-world data and help companies understand the health of the physical assets around them.

From there, the conversation gets especially interesting. Loosararian explains why he turned down Silicon Valley investment that would have required Gecko to build its technology in a lab, arguing that companies solving physical-world problems need to stay close to their customers and collect real-world data. That philosophy ultimately helped keep Gecko rooted in Pittsburgh.

He also delivers a provocative take on SBIR grants, warning entrepreneurs not to confuse grant funding with genuine customer demand, and details how Gecko's commercial traction helped pave the way for major work with the U.S. Navy.

And perhaps most importantly, Loosararian lays out a bigger vision for Pittsburgh: a city that builds and scales category-defining companies instead of simply serving as an outpost for companies headquartered somewhere else.

It's a fast-moving conversation about robotics, AI, infrastructure, defense, entrepreneurship and what it really takes to build technology that works when the stakes are real.