Inside Alaska Business
McFarlane Aviation
Alaskan Bushwheels and Airframes Alaska are coming together under McFarlane Alaska, a new brand of McFarlane Aviation, itself a business line of Kansas-based Victor Sierra. The Palmer-based maker of airplane landing gear and other parts for backcountry aviation rebranded in 2024 as Alaska Gear Company. As that company diversified its outdoor equipment offerings, owner Sean McLaughlin sold the aviation side to Victor Sierra, which formed in 2021.
Global Credit Union
Global Credit Union, in partnership with Ukpeaġvik Iñupiat Corporation, opened a new branch inside the AC Stuaqpak supermarket in Utqiaġvik. The new branch is the credit union’s 28th in Alaska and its 1st north of Fairbanks, joining the Alaska Commercial Company supermarket that returned to the property last year.
The Agency
Global real estate brokerage The Agency is launching its newest office in Anchorage, establishing the brand’s first location in Alaska. Managing Partners Emma Shibe and Bethany Weiser, industry veterans and lifelong Alaskans, are leading the new office in Midtown. The Agency has become one of the fastest-growing luxury boutique brokerages in the world, opening twenty-seven new offices in 2025, with more on the horizon.
Launch Alaska
Remote Hands and Applied Atomics are the Alaska-grown companies among eight energy and tech startups in the new cohort under Launch Alaska’s wing. Remote Hands is a gig work platform that places technicians in rural communities. The other Anchorage selection, Applied Atomics, is developing a nuclear reactor in the 100 MW to 1,000 MW range, as big as the most powerful conventional generators in Alaska, and then some.
Santos
Santos completed the Quokka-1 appraisal well, prompting plans for development to a follow-up on par with Pikka Phase 1, which achieved first oil on May 14. The company says Quokka-1 encountered a high-quality reservoir with 143 feet of net oil pay in the Nanushuk formation, and an initial test achieved a flow rate of 2,190 barrels of oil per day. Managing Director Kevin Gallagher says Quokka, east of the Pikka unit, “represents another high-return opportunity that strengthens our position on the North Slope.”
The Wildbirch Hotel
The next phase of renovation at The Wildbirch Hotel included the launch in May of Undertap, a microbrewery and tasting room through a partnership with Midnight Sun Brewing. The former Holiday Inn on Fourth Avenue in Anchorage, which reopened last year with JdV by Hyatt affiliation, was named this spring on Travel + Leisure’s annual “It List,” featuring the best 100 hotels globally. The Wildbirch Hotel is the only Alaska property on the 2026 list, and one of 19 in the United States.
Alpenglow Woodfired Pizza
Haines is down to one year-round dinner restaurant after the town’s only pizza joint closed in April. Alpenglow Woodfired Pizza owner Nolan Woodard said he had yet to turn a profit, and he was unable to reach a new lease agreement with the landlord. That leaves Lighthouse Restaurant and Harbor Bar as the only dining option outside of visitor season.
Firebrand BBQ
The US Small Business Administration selected Chad and Stephanie Higgins, owners of Firebrand BBQ in Seward, as Alaska’s Small Business Person of the Year for 2026. Chad honed his barbeque skills in Amarillo, Texas, while working as a firefighter before he and his wife retired to Seward in 2017. The couple traveled to Washington, DC, for an awards ceremony in early May before racing home for the start of tourism season.