— Xbox Chief Operating Officer Helen Chiang has suddenly left Microsoft after 21 years with the company, just months after landing the role in July. Her past roles include leading Mojang and the Minecraft franchise.

Verge first reported the news on Friday, citing a memo from Xbox CEO Asha Sharma that did not disclose the reason for her departure.

An Xbox spokesperson was likewise mum on details. “We don’t discuss individual personnel matters. We’re grateful for Helen’s years of service and wish her well,” the company said in an email to GeekWire.

Xbox has undergone a massive reorganization that included Chiang’s appointment, roughly 3,200 job cuts through the fiscal year — about 20% of the Xbox workforce — the spinoff of four game studios and a plan to dramatically flatten management.

— Seattle-based tech leader Philip Su has joined Anthropic as a member of technical staff on beneficial deployments. The management role focuses on AI applications in global health, life sciences, economic mobility and education.

Su started his tech career with 12 years at Microsoft and later worked for Facebook. He has launched multiple ventures, including Audere, a global health software nonprofit, and Superphonic, a podcast player. In 2021, he worked at an Amazon fulfillment center to experience the holiday rush.

Su also created and leads an annual course for University of Washington computer science students on how to maximize their personal and professional growth.

— More leadership changes are underway at SeekOut, a Bellevue-based recruiting startup launched in 2017. The company announced Monday that co-founder John Tippett is now president, moving from his role as chief client officer.

In April, SeekOut CEO and co-founder Anoop Gupta retired and passed the reins to enterprise software veteran Sean Thompson. In August, co-founder and chief technology officer Aravind Bala took over as CEO. Thompson is now listed as an adviser to the board.

Tippett will lead day-to-day operations and work with Bala “on the company’s direction,” according to a press release. SeekOut said it wants to integrate AI tools into customers’ operations to reduce recruiters’ workload.

SeekOut is No. 68 on the GeekWire 200, a ranked index of the Pacific Northwest’s top startups.

— Fred Hutch Cancer Center has appointed Michael (Mick) Merritt as vice president of strategy and partnerships, effective Dec. 7.

Merritt joins from Penn Medicine, where he was chief operating officer of Penn Signature Services. He has more than 25 years of experience in academic medicine, consulting, strategy, business development and operations.

— Industrial wastewater treatment startup Membrion has named Alexander Demihovsky as director of applications engineering. He joins the Seattle-based company from Xylem. His past employers include Evoqua Water Technologies and Bechtel National.

“Alex helps turn customer needs into viable project plans, mitigate execution risks and develop competitive proposals,” the company said.

Membrion is No. 160 on the GeekWire 200.

— Marine geothermal energy startup Endurance Energy has named Marty Calvert as the director of turbomachinery. Calvert joins the Seattle startup from Blue Origin. He was previously a turbomachinery engineer at NASA for more than 13 years.

Endurance completed its fifth deployment to the ocean floor last month, testing Adélie, a 100-kilowatt geothermal generator named for a penguin.

— Lattice Semiconductor, a Hillsboro, Ore.-based company, has added two directors to its board:

• Raejeanne Skillern, former VP and chief marketing officer of Amazon Web Services, who returns to Lattice after serving on the board from 2022 to 2024
• John McCool, senior vice president and special adviser to the CEO at Arista Networks

Endurance Energy says its prototype marine geothermal power system generated more electricity than it consumed during a recent deployment 300 miles off the Oregon coast — though the milestone lasted just 8.7 seconds.

The Seattle-based startup landed its 3-ton power plant on the seafloor near a natural vent releasing water at about 538 degrees Fahrenheit. The team operated the system remotely through a fiber-optic network running along the seabed.

The expedition marked Endurance’s fifth deployment to the ocean floor where it tested Adélie — a 100-kilowatt geothermal generator named for a penguin.

The company is part of a broader race to harness geothermal energy, using heat from water or steam under the Earth’s crust, converted into electricity. But while companies such as Fervo and Sage Geosystems focus on terrestrial sites, Endurance is the first commercial venture pursuing undersea sources.

“The main question we had is can the system generate more power than it uses,” Andrew Redd, Endurance’s founder and CEO, said in a statement about the expedition, which began last month.

“Adélie did,” he added. “Goddard’s first liquid-fueled rocket flew for two and a half seconds. Our first net-positive run lasted about nine. Our approach is to make it exist, then make it good.”

The test produced only a brief burst of surplus electricity, reaching a peak net output of 16.5 kilowatts. Challenges with the technology and a failure of a power cable cut the dive short.

The team also drilled what it called the world’s first geothermal well. At a site about 5,000 feet below the ocean’s surface, its machinery created two bore holes that tapped into hydrothermal fluid. It capped one hole and drilled a roughly 2-inch wide, 52-foot deep geothermal well at the other. While the well delivered hot fluid, it wasn’t suited for testing the energy system, sending the team to the natural vent.

Endurance said the expedition included voluntary environmental monitoring. The team mapped the seafloor to select the least disruptive test site, sampled water before and after operations, surveyed marine life and monitored sound.

While the startup has made rapid progress, its approach faces significant challenges: high pressure and corrosive conditions, mineral buildup inside equipment and the risk of costly repairs to seafloor machinery. And although many population centers sit near coastlines, the systems would still need expensive subsea cables to carry electricity over potentially long distances.

The company has raised $63 million from investors and has roughly three-dozen employees.

This winter, Endurance plans to deploy Gentoo, a refurbished and upgraded version of Adélie designed to generate more power for longer periods.

The company is also developing its first commercial project in Tonga, with the goal of delivering its first electricity in 2027.

The world’s first demonstration of a subsea geothermal power plant has taken place near an active underwater volcano almost a mile below the ocean surface. It generated less than 10 seconds of net-positive electricity but showed the technical feasibility of tapping another form of renewable energy underwater.

The three-week test deployment of the 3-ton prototype power plant took place at the Axial Seamount in the northeast Pacific Ocean in September. Endurance Energy, the Seattle-based startup behind the effort, aims to eventually commercialize subsea geothermal power for Pacific island nations and other customers looking for alternatives to importing expensive fossil fuels.

“The deep ocean gives us unlimited cold seawater for cooling, and its weight keeps the system and the well pressurized, so our plants can be compact,” said Andrew Redd, founder and CEO of Endurance Energy, in an email to Ars.

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