Houston health tech startups announce exec, funding — plus more innovation news

SHORT STORIES

Houston's health tech and startup ecosystem has some recent news to catch up on. Photo via Getty Images

Houston startup founders have been moving and shaking in the local innovation ecosystem — from growing their executive boards to raising fresh grant funding.

In this roundup of Houston startup and innovation news, a startup opens a crowdfunding round, a Houston hospital system taps into new technology, and more.

Coya Therapeutics names new president and chief medical officer

Fred Grossman will assume his new role next week. Photo via LinkedIn

Coya Therapeutics Inc. (NASDAQ: COYA), a revolutionary biotech company based in Houston, named Dr. Fred Grossman as president and chief medical officer. The clinical-stage company, which has developed a biologics therapy that prevents further spreading of neurodegenerative diseases by making regulatory T cells functional again, announced the closing of its $15.25 million IPO in January.

According to the company, Dr. Grossman's position, which was held by Dr. Adrian Hepner, is effective July 17.

“We are grateful for Dr. Hepner’s leadership and excellence in positioning Coya and look forward to having him continue to collaborate with the company in moving our assets forward," Howard H. Berman, CEO of Coya, says in a news release. "We also welcome Dr. Grossman, who brings decades of clinical development experience and successful execution."

Dr. Grossman has held executive positions at Eli Lilly, Johnson & Johnson, Bristol Myers Squibb, Sunovion, Glenmark Pharmaceuticals, and Mesoblast Inc. (NASDAQ: MESO), developing allogeneic cellular therapies for inflammatory diseases.

CellChorus receives another SBIR grant

CellChorus, a biotech startup operating out of the University of Houston Technology Bridge, has secured additional funding. Photo via Getty Images

Fresh off a $2.3 million grant last month, Houston-based CellChorus, a single-cell analysis company, has another grant to celebrate.

The U.S. National Science Foundation has awarded CellChorus a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grant to advance development of its Time-lapse Imaging Microscopy In Nanowell Grids, known as TIMING. The funding will be used to develop novel microscale arrays to support scaling dynamic single-cell analysis.

“This funding will further development of novel arrays to build on the success of our early access laboratory based in Houston,” says Mohsen Fathi, head of technology at CellChorus, in a press release. “This project will support scaling the only platform that can evaluate migration, contact dynamics, killing, survival, subcellular activity, and biomolecule secretion for the same individual cell over time and in high throughput to improve development and delivery of novel therapies.”

According to the release, the company is receiving more than $274,000 as a part of the grant, but CellChorus has the potential of receiving up to $2 million from the second phase.

“This award builds on our recent funding from the National Institute of General Medical Sciences to advance development of a dedicated instrument platform for TIMING,” says Daniel Meyer, CEO of CellChorus, in the release.

Memorial Hermann partners with TMC-backed virtual OB-GYN care

Two Houston-area hospitals now have access to this digital health startup's platform. Photo via Getty Images

The Memorial Hermann Health System has entered into a partnership with Washington, D.C.-based Babyscripts, a virtual care platform for managing obstetrics. The company is backed by the Texas Medical Center's venture fund and has existing ties to the city.

"Memorial Hermann strives to make Greater Houston a place where every woman's pregnancy, delivery and postpartum experience is successful and safe. This innovative partnership is a continuation of that commitment," says Dr. Victoria Regan, vice president of Women's and Children's Services at Memorial Hermann, in a news release.

Now, Memorial Hermann patients will be able to access Babyscripts myJourney, an app that delivers educational content, email campaigns, satisfaction surveys, appointment reminders, and more. The first two hospitals to receive access are Memorial Hermann Memorial City Medical Center and Memorial Hermann The Woodlands Medical Center, with plans to expand the program.

"The ability to access adequate prenatal and postpartum care is one of the largest predictors of maternal and infant health outcomes," says Anish Sebastian, CEO and co-founder of Babyscripts in the release. "With Babyscripts, Memorial Hermann is able to streamline the maternal health experience across their system, adding opportunities for access and providing consistent, high-quality pregnancy care to all patients, regardless of race, income, geography or risk."

Earn Your Freedom launches crowdfunding campaign with Houston nonprofit's support

Earn Your Freedom is looking for financial support from its community. Photo via houston.impacthub.net

Earn Your Freedom, a Houston startup that's gamifying personal finance education, has launched its first crowdfunding campaign in partnership with Impact Hub Houston.

The goal for EYF is to raise $100,000 to support its gaming programs with local schools. Impact Hub Houston is the fiscal sponsor for the raise, which is officially live and open for contributions.

The innovative and interactive web and mobile video game, which officially launched earlier this year to celebrate Financial Literacy Month, was designed to help kids build a strong foundation in money management, economics and investment in a fun and engaging way. It features challenges and real-world scenarios such as renting a first apartment, opening a first bank account, budgeting at the grocery store, buying stocks and index funds and renting or buying real estate.

“We envision a society where financial literacy is accessible to all, and where individuals are enabled with the tools to take control of their financial futures," says Keely McEnery, EYF co-founder and COO, in a press release. "We are bridging the gap between education and application, stepping in before the real-world consequences take place.”

From Your Site Articles

Ad Placement 300x100

Ad Placement 300x600

CultureMap Emails are Awesome

Property Showcase

Being prepared: Has the Texas grid been adequately winterized?

Being Prepared

Houstonians may feel anxious as the city and state experience freezing temperatures this winter. Every year since 2021’s Winter Storm Uri, Texans wonder whether the grid will keep them safe in the face of another. The record-breaking cold temperatures of Uri exposed a crucial vulnerability in the state’s power and water infrastructure.

According to ERCOT’s 6-day supply and demand forecast from January 3, 2025, it expected plenty of generation capacity to meet the needs of Texans during the most recent period of colder weather. So why did the grid fail so spectacularly in 2021?

Demand for electricity surged as millions of people tried to heat their homes.
ERCOT was simply not prepared despite previous winter storms of similar intensity to offer lessons in similarities.
The state was highly dependent on un-winterized natural gas power plants for electricity.
The Texas grid is isolated from other states.
Failures of communication and coordination between ERCOT, state officials, utility companies, gas suppliers, electricity providers, and power plants contributed to the devastating outages.

The domino effect resulted in power outages for millions of Texans, the deaths of hundreds of Texans, billions of dollars in damages, with some households going nearly a week without heat, power, and water. This catastrophe highlighted the need for swift and sweeping upgrades and protections against future extreme weather events.

Texas State Legislature Responds

Texas lawmakers proactively introduced and passed legislation aimed at upgrading the state’s power infrastructure and preventing repeated failures within weeks of the storm. Senate Bill 3 (SB3) measures included:

Requirements to weatherize gas supply chain and pipeline facilities that sell electric energy within ERCOT.
The ability to impose penalties of up to $1 million for violation of these requirements.
Requirement for ERCOT to procure new power sources to ensure grid reliability during extreme heat and extreme cold.
Designation of specific natural gas facilities that are critical for power delivery during energy emergencies.
Development of an alert system that is to be activated when supply may not be able to meet demand.
Requirement for the Public Utility Commission of Texas, or PUCT, to establish an emergency wholesale electricity pricing program.

Texas Weatherization by Natural Gas Plants

In a Railroad Commission of Texas document published May 2024 and geared to gas supply chain and pipeline facilities, dozens of solutions were outlined with weatherization best practices and approaches in an effort to prevent another climate-affected crisis from severe winter weather.

Some solutions included:

Installation of insulation on critical components of a facility.
Construction of permanent or temporary windbreaks, housing, or barriers around critical equipment to reduce the impact of windchill.
Guidelines for the removal of ice and snow from critical equipment.
Instructions for the use of temporary heat systems on localized freezing problems like heating blankets, catalytic heaters, or fuel line heaters.

According to Daniel Cohan, professor of environmental engineering at Rice University, power plants across Texas have installed hundreds of millions of dollars worth of weatherization upgrades to their facilities. In ERCOT’s January 2022 winterization report, it stated that 321 out of 324 electricity generation units and transmission facilities fully passed the new regulations.

Is the Texas Grid Adequately Winterized?

Utilities, power generators, ERCOT, and the PUCT have all made changes to their operations and facilities since 2021 to be better prepared for extreme winter weather. Are these changes enough? Has the Texas grid officially been winterized?

This season, as winter weather tests Texans, residents may potentially experience localized outages. When tree branches cannot support the weight of the ice, they can snap and knock out power lines to neighborhoods across the state. In the instance of a downed power line, we must rely on regional utilities to act quickly to restore power.

The specific legislation enacted by the Texas state government in response to the 2021 disaster addressed to the relevant parties ensures that they have done their part to winterize the Texas grid.

---

Sam Luna is director at BKV Energy, where he oversees brand and go-to-market strategy, customer experience, marketing execution, and more.

3 Houston innovators to know right now

who's who

Editor's note: InnovationMap regularly introduces its readers to a handful of Houston innovators recently making headlines with news of innovative technology, investment activity, and more. Our first January batch includes three innovators across social impact, health care, and more.

Phillip Yates, CEO of Equiliberty

Phillip Yates joins the Houston Innovators Podcast to share why 2025 is the year of launch for Equiliberty. Photo courtesy of Equiliberty

For Phillip Yates, this year will be the year of launch. The attorney-turned-entrepreneur has been working on his fintech platform, Equiliberty, for years now, but come the first half of 2025, it's go time.

"We're going to release our technology in Q2 of this year, and we're looking to commercialize it by the end of this year," Yates says on the Houston Innovators Podcast.

The platform connects users with resources to build wealth. Yates, along with his co-founders, Rachel Howard and Cody Bailey, created the company with the mindset that people with lower financial means can take control of their own financial success — in a way that doesn't take away from anyone else. Continue reading.

Meagan Pitcher, co-founder and CEO of Bairitone Health

Meagan Pitcher, co-founder and CEO of Bairitone Health, joins the Houston Innovators Podcast. Photo courtesy of Bairitone

There's a slew of treatment options for people living with sleep apnea. But, the bigger problem, as Meagan Pitcher realized during her time at the Texas Medical Center's Biodesign program, is that there's no easy way to reliably diagnose and determine a treatment plan for patients.

"We saw all of the companies trying to solve the problem of making the airway collapse less or make the air way wider — it might be surgery, might be medication, or nerve stimulation," Pitcher says on the Houston Innovators Podcast. "One of the things we found was that it was really hard to match a patient with sleep apnea with a good treatment for them. One of the reasons is it's hard to get an understanding of where the individual's site of collapse is as sleep medicine is currently practiced."

As Pitcher went through the TMC Biodesign program, she teamed up with her co-founders — CTO Onur Kilicand and CMO Britt Cross — to find a solution, and together they developed Bairitone Health. The company's technology provides at-home medical imaging using sonar sensing. The non-invasive device has the potential to replace the current standard of care, which is a surgical procedure. Continue reading.

Moody Heard, CEO of BuildForce

Houston-based Buildforce is developing a technology to better connect contractors and the trade professionals they employ. Photo courtesy of Buildforce

Houston-based Buildforce announced it has acquired Ladder, which is a Y Combinator-backed, technology-enabled construction labor marketplace.

The acquisition is part of Buildforce’s expansion plans into the southeastern U.S. and during a time of increased demand for skilled construction talent. Buildforce will work to leverage the Ladder customer base of over 200 customers across six states, as well as its extensive electrician network of over 10,000 pre-screened electricians, which is the largest in the Southeast.

“There are two major problems plaguing the construction labor market,” Moody Heard, co-founder and CEO of Buildforce, says in a news release. “One, the project-based nature of construction work means tradesmen are constantly ‘working themselves out of a job’, meaning high employee turnover. And two, the industry is experiencing a secular decline in the supply of tradesmen relative to surging demand.” Continue reading.

Houston sportstech startup shoots, scores in Pharrell Williams competition

on the rebound

Anyone who's witnessed even just a minute of basketball knows how important accuracy is in sinking shots on the court. One Houston startup has developed a device to help practice make perfect in a game.

GRIND’s portable basketball shooting machine, the first of its kind, was created by founder and CEO Thomas Fields, former basketball phenom at Houston’s Reagan High School (now Heights High School).

“I remember being on varsity as a freshman and shooting thousands of shots every day trying to be the best,” says Fields. “My school bought a shooting machine, but they never let me use it. It was a game-changing piece of equipment, and I didn’t even have access because the gyms were always closed or closing.

“And another major problem was getting your rebounds, so we set out to make a portable basketball rebounding machine, so you could take it anywhere like home, the park, or the gym. It was also important to make it affordable, too.”

The GRIND shooting machine is available online. Photo via grindbasketball.com

At just 110 pounds, the GRIND shooting machine is 54 percent lighter than other home shooting machines, has a 12-foot net, and needs just 90 seconds to set up or take down.

“Our portable shooting machine has been on the market for about three, four years now,” says Fields. “So now it's time to kind of accelerate the growth, and that’s pretty exciting. We really have our sights on NBA Africa for a partnership there. Another one is Adidas; we are collaborating with them right now and they're also one of the sponsors of Black Hat Mission. And hopefully, we would like to land some NBA guys to invest and really get behind our sportstech company, but also make a significant impact in the community by getting kids into tech through sports.”

To that end, GRIND recently won second place in a competition from Black Ambition, an organization founded by Pharrell Williams. With the tagline, “Uninterrupted ambition. Unmatched impact,” the Black Ambition Prize celebrates underrepresented founders globally.

“When I initially heard of Black Ambition, I just kind of heard that Pharrell had started a venture fund aimed at uplifting black and brown entrepreneurs,” says Fields. “And when I read more about it, I realized that their mission perfectly aligned with GRIND. Our goal is to try to get kids into tech and STEM, but use sports as the conduit and the bridge to get them there.

“We applied for the million-dollar cash prize for first place, but took second place, which is a $250,000 investment in the company. So now that Pharrell and Black Ambition are behind us, we are going out and raising some more capital to hit that hyper stage that we're going into. We are launching our software next year and our hardware has really been growing.”

Fields pitched GRIND on Shark Tank in May of 2021, where he was offered a joint deal for $250,000 for 25 percent of the company from both Mark Cuban and Barbara Corcoran. While Fields agreed on the show, the finalized terms of the deal were not disclosed.

- YouTubeThomas Fields is seeking $250000 for a 5% stake of GRIND. From Season 12 Episode 23 Watch Now: ...

As a startup, GRIND, a consumer brand developing the world’s first smart ecosystem of sports equipment products, represents the continued uptick with sportstech innovation in Houston.

“We want to revolutionize the world of sports equipment by leveraging cutting edge technology by developing sports equipment that can seamlessly connect to software, enhancing athletic performance, and pushing athletes to achieve their peak potential,” Fields says.

As GRIND continues to push forward and expand its footprint, it’s also looking to expand its customer base.

“I think the target users are middle school and high school athletes,” says Fields. “These are the kids that are striving to be great athletes and striving to get into college. We also have colleges that have our product, as well. But mostly, the customer is the parents of those athletes. That's really who we're trying to get excited.

“And then, of course, there are the coaches and trainers. They own gyms; they own organizations and need equipment for their schools and universities. That's another target customer of ours for sure.”

Ultimately, GRIND will continue to build on Fields’ initial inspiration to design products and technologies with the athletes — especially hoopers — in mind.

“Our goal in the next few years is to really amp up the scholarships that we facilitate to funnel kids into STEM tech careers and pathways,” says Fields. “GRIND Day, which is a proclamation the City of Houston gave us for August 12 each year, is a day where we bring sports, tech, and culture all under one umbrella. Kids see us using 3D printers and lasers to cut the products that we make in our warehouse, which is in an underserved community, which hopefully makes them think it’s cool and want to get into technology.”

View All Listings

INNOVATIONMAP EMAILS ARE AWESOME