A Comprehensive Guide to Oklahoma City’s Tech Scene

9 min readOct 2, 2018

Oklahoma City has a surprisingly robust tech scene. The city offers a variety of events and organizations, both general and niche, that cater to the interests of technology professionals across all corners of the industry.

I started finding out about the tech community in Oklahoma City through Twitter. A few years ago, I followed one account and started receiving suggestions to follow more and more groups. I was amazed by how much

there was — and the list has gotten much longer since then.

I have attended events here and there during college. The few that I attended introduced me to incredible mentors and opportunities. I have yet to attend all the events or visit all the places on my list, but I always get asked by students and recent graduates about getting more involved with the tech community in Oklahoma City. I thought it would be helpful to compile all the resources that I’ve read about in one place. I found out about most of these through Twitter, Meetup, or Techlahoma.

General

1 Million Cups is a weekly educational program that allows entrepreneurs and startups to connect with the community. These entrepreneurs tell their communities what they are creating, and engage in conversations with community members. This organization is active in both Oklahoma City and Norman.

Code for OKC is a volunteer-based organization that is part of the Code for America family. Code for America is a national nonprofit that connects people with technical skills to projects that help and improve local government.

Code Norman is an organization in Norman that hosts general coding meetings around the city. Events include open topic discussions, lunch and learns, and tutorial.

The Div is an Oklahoma City-based nonprofit empowering and enabling children to learn computer science. The Div is also a Code.org Professional Learning Partner. Get involved with this organization by volunteering (it’s really fun!), donating, and/or advocating.

FreeCodeCamp provides the opportunity to learn to code every week with peers in your community. This organization uses freecodecamp.org and is active in Norman and Oklahoma City.

Innovate Oklahoma is a unique initiative that brings the general public, developers, and the government together. People can suggest technological projects that would be helpful for the government to have. Developers can then pitch solutions for approved projects. The final stage is when government agencies, technologists, and the public collaborate to develop a solution.

i2E stands for “Innovation to Enterprise” and it is an organization that helps launch new businesses. i2E offers venture advising and assessment, offers funding through their Small Business Innovation Research and Small Business Technology Transfer programs, and other grant funding services. i2E also offers access to capital by managing two government funds and an angel investment fund. i2E hosts events focused on entrepreneurship such as the Love’s Cup and offers its own events as well.

Nerd Beers is a meet up to discuss all things nerdy. Past topics include IoT devices, Amazon Go, and SpaceX Satellite Internet.

Nerdy Girls OKC is an empowering club for women that is not limited to just tech. Their events include creative writing groups, bookclubs, and cooking classes.

OK Coders is a developer bootcamp — the only one in Oklahoma! They have offered courses in a beginning programming, intermediate programming, mobile development, and data analytics. They offer classes in Tulsa as well as Oklahoma City.

OKCTechEvents (also on Twitter) is a good resource to keep up with some of these events!

OK!NNOVATE was founded by the E Foundation to ‘to convene and cultivate Oklahoma’s entrepreneurial community and back it with actionable pathways, resources, and support that will propel our state to a top-ten ranking.’

OKC Innovation District aims to take advantage of the area around the Oklahoma Health Center, which has demonstrated promise for startup growth. This district is backed by much research on why it is needed. The hope is to mirror the success of similar innovation districts in Boston, Brooklyn, Chicago, Portland, Providence, San Francisco and Seattle.

Oklahoma Women in Tech is an organization for women in technology that puts a strong emphasis on mentorships. OKWiT has one meeting a month (in both Tulsa and Oklahoma City). The Oklahoma City chapter additionally hosts lunch-and-learn type events.

Product TankOKC is an international organization that provides a platform for product people — like product managers, designers, and developers. Meetings include guest speakers and networking.

The Ronnie K. Irani Center for the Creation of Economic Wealth (i-CCEW) is an organization based out of the University of Oklahoma that is focused on economic development. They work on initiatives both inside and outside of the university. i-CCEW is responsible for the Oklahoma Funding Accelerator, The Mine (OKC and Tulsa), and OK Coders. OK Coders was the first coding bootcamp in Oklahoma. At OU, they provide students the opportunity to work with university researchers, community mentors, and startups through their internship program. They are also a community sponsor for 1 Million Cups OKC.

SheCodesOKC is a group of women in tech in Oklahoma who empower and support each other through their events. These include workshops, guest speakers, and “hackternoons”.

Startup Grind is an international organization powered by Google for Entrepreneurs. Their first in-person event was a fireside chat with a local tech entrepreneur.

Techlahoma is a non-profit organization whose mission is to teach, educate, connect and empower the people in our state through learning technical skills. This organization hosts 32 free user groups across the state. You can follow their livestreams on Twitch, join the Slack, apply to start a usergroup, and — of course — check out one of their existing usergroups!

Tech on Tap is hosted by Robert Half Technology. Their past events have consisted of themes, drinks, food, and games.

Tom Love Innovation Hub is an incredible resource at the University of Oklahoma. The Innovation Hub offers a unique space on the first floor for collaboration. It also has a Digital Fabrication Lab, Code Lab, Visualization Clinic, and a Legal Clinic. There are also a number of meetings and workshops hosted at the Innovation Hub, such as Norman VR/AR, 3D Printing 101, 3D Scanning 101, and a weekly Hack and Learn.

Conferences & Events

The Entrepreneurial Summit is an event hosted by i2E that provides budding entrepreneurs with local resources to help their businesses flourish.

Hacklahoma is the first and only hackathon in the state of Oklahoma, hosted at The University of Oklahoma by sACM . This is an annual event open to college students. This event is affiliated with Major League Hacking — the official collegiate hackathon league. Hacklahoma’s inaugural event in March 2018 attracted hundreds of students from around the country. Although this is a student event, you may attend by becoming a sponsor. Student hackathons are extremely valuable because they showcase student talent, develop a recruiting pipeline, and foster university connections.

The Love’s Entrepreneur Cup is a business plan competition for college students. This event hopes to are prove can produce entrepreneurs to lead future startups. More than 35 business plans from this competition have gone on to become i2E clients.

Startup OKC is a weekend-long competition to form a startup. This provides the opportunity to connect with passionate new people, compete with other business ideas, and get mentorship along the way.

OU Startup Weekend a very similar event as Startup OKC, but geared towards college students at OU.

TEDx stands for independently hosted TED conferences. Upcoming events include TEDxUCOWomen, TEDxOklahomaCity, TEDxYouth@OKC, and TEDxOU. Many previous events have included talks about innovation and growth around Oklahoma.

ThunderPlains is a Techlahoma conference for web and mobile developers — specifically Javascript users. ThunderPlains places a big emphasis on the local tech community, so it would be worthwhile attending even without using Javascript.

Data

Big Data OKC is a big data and data science group that meets monthly. Leaders in data across the city present the innovative ways they are using data in their organizations. Additionally, this group introduces members to new technologies. Previous topics have included presentations on data usage at American Fidelity Assurance, Love’s Travel Stops, the OKC Thunder (yes, the Thunder!), and Sonic Drive-In. Past workshops-style topics have included introductions on Azure, Hadoop, and deep learning.

Data + Creativity OKC hosts a well-rounded calendar of events that rotate through 4 categories: Getting Technical, The Human Component, Exaptation in Action, and Nerdy Movie Night.

OKC Analytics meets monthly to share best practices and learning related to analytics. Previous meeting topics include Exploring Data with R and an introduction to Google Tag Manager.

Incubators & Accelerators

Acorn Growth Companies invests and manages portfolios exclusively for aerospace and defense companies.

Business Development Center (BDC) at the Moore Norman Technology Center hopes to help early phase startups. To become a BDC client, one must present a business idea to the incubator coordinator, demonstrate financial capacity to fund the idea, and submit an application.

The Catbird Seat is a University of Central Oklahoma-based small business incubator. They offer advising as well. The incubator has office space to rent. They are specifically interested in creative companies, service-based companies, and home-based companies.

i2E, listed above, provides incredible resources for startups. These include venture advisory services, access to capital, and entrepreneurial development. i2E has an extensive portfolio of 116 companies. i2E has been helping startups for 20 years and has invested $42 million in 180 companies. Additionally, i2E has provided business advice to over 700 small business across the state.

Launch is a part of the Tom Love Center for Entrepreneurship at OU. Launch provides two different opportunities to students: a proof-of-concept program through the Sooner Innovation Fund and a business accelerator through the Sooner Launch Pad. The Sooner Launch Pad is accessible to students, alumni, and community members.

The Launch Pad is a business incubator at Francis Tuttle provides community members an opportunity to grow their startups. Admission criteria includes startup or early stage business, viable product or service, business plan, economic impact, initial capitalization, entrepreneurial capability, and coachability.

Project 3810 is certified business incubator that offers mentoring, coaching, training, infrastructure, and connections. Find more information here.

Startup 405 is a resource through the Norman Economic Development Coalition. Applications may be filled out here. Although the website is not yet up, more information can be found in this article.

Thunder Launchpad is business accelerator run by the Oklahoma City Thunder (!) and StitchCrew and sponsored by MidFirst Bank. They offer a free working space and much more.

“Busy desks with iMac computers in an empty workspace” by Annie Spratt on Unsplash

Makerspace & Co-working

The Barn OKC, located in the Plaza District, offers a warm and bright atmosphere and in an exciting part of town. They are open Monday to Friday, 9 to 5. The Barn offers different membership options, listed on their website.

Halcyon Works is a modern space located near Paseo Arts District. They offer drop-in as well as membership options.

Lakefront Hub is located on Ski Island Lake in northwest OKC. They offer reasonable pricing and a nice view.

Project 3810 is a co-working and office space, event center, and business incubator located in northwest OKC.

Prototek OKC is a makerspace community in Midtown OKC that offers machining, electronics, woodworking, 3D Printing, vinyl cutting, and graphic design. Prototek hosts open shop nights every month. View the schedule here.

Rise Coworking offers a bright and happy workspace in Moore. They have flexible membership options to choose from.

StarSpace46 describes itself as “the hub for coworking space, tech events, and entrepreneurship” and they’re not wrong. They host many user group meetings each month. The space is designed for tech startups with a number of options to choose from.

The Uncommon Seed is a cozy, aesthetically-pleasing space located in Midtown OKC. They offer three different membership options and also host events.

User Groups:

Below is a list of meetings and organizations specific to a technology. These are self-explanatory so they are accompanied with a link to their social media and/or websites.